


An Exercise in Minute Details

by MisasBiggestFan



Series: A Fragile Sort of Friendship [1]
Category: Death Note & Related Fandoms, Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Aromantic, Asexual Character, Asexual L Lawliet, Asexual Light Yagami, Brotp, Light and L spend their days tormenting each other endlessly, Light never found the death note au, Light self-destructs fabulously and L is forced to do ordinary household tasks, No Romance, Other, Trans L Lawliet, Trans Light Yagami, Trans Male Character, lawlight, trans aroace L, trans aroace Light
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2019-08-06 20:09:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 30,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16394288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MisasBiggestFan/pseuds/MisasBiggestFan
Summary: When Ryuzaki finds the neighbor, Light Yagami, keying his car, he takes it as a challenge that throws them both into a secret battle of vandalism and destruction. Amidst the wreckage, Ryuzaki finds that he and Light are perfectly matched friends and perfectly equal enemies.-Ryuzaki wanted to peel away this fakeness he was seeing now and find the car-keying Light, the one who’d watched him methodically until he understood his schedule-a premeditated vandalism. The Light who snickered while he scraped the paint off Ryuzaki’s car door with the sharp end of his house key. This Light who politely ate his cake and offered obligatory laughs at all the right times was hiding someone sort of scheming, someone a little malicious and childish.Maybe Ryuzaki cared because he was a little scheming and a little malicious and a little childish, too. He and Light just wore different shaped masks.





	1. Chapter 1

Ryuzaki walked out of his apartment that morning exhaustedly, coffee in hand, to find the neighbor keying his car.

He stood on the other side of the car and watched the neighbor snicker to himself as he dug his keys into the metal.

“You’re going to have to pay for that,” Ryuzaki said. The man jumped, his keys flying into the air. He cursed loudly.

Ryuzaki opened the driver’s side door, preparing to get in.

“I-I,” the man said, seemingly at a loss. Then, he cried, “you were supposed to be asleep right now! You don’t leave the house until 12 most days!”

“Today’s special,” Ryuzaki said.

“Why?!” The man demanded.

“Because I saw someone keying my car,” he replied dryly, holding the door open. “And besides, just because I’m in the house doesn’t mean I’m asleep.”

“But you’re out all night,” the neighbor replied hotly and he folded his arms tight. “And all day. You only come home right before _I_ get off work and you park in my spot.” He folded his arms. “You have to be asleep then.”

“Well, I’m not,” Ryuzaki said and he sat down in the seat of his car. “And the spots don’t matter.”

“They’re _assigned_ ,” the man hissed. “You have to follow the rules.”

“I’ll be sending the bill to your place,” Ryuzaki said back and he took a sip of his coffee and shut the door to the car. He turned the key in the ignition and pulled out of the parking lot, leaving his neighbor behind, obviously fuming. He laughed to himself a little as he drove the car to the repair shop.

When he got home, the neighbor was pacing in front of his door.

Ryuzaki tried to push past him to get inside, but the neighbor started talking.

“Hey,” he said sheepishly. “I wanted to come over and just tell you how sorry I am. Really. That was, well, it was just beyond out of line for me and I wasn’t thinking and I’ll totally pay the repairs. It was a really, really stupid mistake.”

Something about the man now struck Ryuzaki as… As fake. Ryuzaki looked at his sheepish grin and imagined he could see right through it. This wasn’t real, he was lying. The version of him that keyed Ryuzaki’s car, _that_ was real.

“Is there anything else I can do to make it up to you?” The man asked. “I know you must think I’m crazy.”

“Hmm,” Ryuzaki said. “Yes, I do.”

The man looked a little taken aback by this.

Ryuzaki unlocked his apartment door and stepped inside and then he turned to the man.

“Come in,” he invited.

“Oh,” the man said, but he followed Ryuzaki and shut the door behind him.

“What did you say your name was?” Ryuzaki asked, turning around to face him.

“Light,” he replied. “Yagami.”

“Nice to meet you,” Ryuzaki said. He didn’t offer Light a place to sit. Instead, he pulled the bill from the repair shop out of his back pocket. “Here,” he said.

Light took it.

“I’ll get this back to you,” Light said. “Again, I’m sorry.”

There was an awkward pause and Light turned to leave.

Before he could open the door, Ryuzaki spoke again.

“You key cars often?”

Something thrill-seeking inside him wanted to see that car-keying side of Light again. He wanted to see the childish anger that insisted that Ryuzaki ‘follow the rules’. He didn’t want Light to leave.

Light turned around, looking displeased and a little embarrassed.

“No,” he said. “I don’t.”

Ding ding ding! Bells in Ryuzaki’s head went off again. This was a lie.

“Well that’s good,” Ryuzaki said, despite the fact that he knew the truth. Then, he turned around and looked back at his kitchen, trying to think of a way to get Light to stay, to talk to him. Was he a chronic car-key-er? What else had he done? “Why don’t you stay for cake, Light?” He asked, coming up with the idea on the fly. “I baked some last night.”

Light hesitated by the door, the bill in his hand. Ryuzaki could practically see the cogs turning behind his eyes, bewildered, trying to think of a way to politely say no.

Ryuzaki knew he looked wild. He came and went at all hours. His house was so bare it was practically sterilized. He wore essentially the same beat-up jeans and t-shirt day in and day out and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a haircut. He knew his presence unsettled people sometimes. Light was taking all this in, including the fact that Ryuzaki never parked in his assigned spot, and the fact that if anyone was going to slip Light something dangerous right now, it would be Ryuzaki. Not only had Light vandalized his car, giving him a motive, but Ryuzaki just _looked_ unhinged.

He headed to the kitchen anyway.

“I’ll have some too,” he said dryly. “So you know it’s not poison.”

The joke seemed to set Light at a bit more ease.

“I didn’t think that,” Light said and he took a few steps forward again.

Ryuzaki entered the kitchen and pulled out his cake from the night before. He brought out two plates with forks, one for him and one for Light, and then he sat on the couch.

Ryuzaki sat with his feet up, crouched. Awkwardly, Light sat next to him.

“You haven’t told me your name yet,” Light said.

“Ah,” Ryuzaki said. “You may call me Ryuzaki.”

He handed the second plate of cake to Light.

Light took it awkwardly.

“Oh,” he said. “Thank you. Can I ask, Ryuzaki, what it is you do for work? I’ve noticed your schedule is so erratic and it’s almost as if you never rest!” He laughed, a polite and conversational laugh. Ryuzaki didn’t bother faking one back. Light wanted to know why he was wrong, where he had erred in trying to suss out Ryuzaki’s schedule. He’s not repentant, Ryuzaki thought, intrigued. He’s bitter. He’s a sore loser. This is fun, Ryuzaki thought.

“I’m a private detective,” he said and he put another piece of cake into his mouth. “And I do odd jobs on the side.”

“Odd jobs?” Light asked.

“Yes,” Ryuzaki said and he didn’t elaborate.

“I can’t really imagine _you_ doing yardwork or plumbing or whatever odd jobs you mean!” Light said.

“Mm,” Ryuzaki said. “Because that’s not the odd jobs I mean.” He took another bite of cake and let the ominous comment hang in the air. No doubt Light was thinking he was some sort of hitman or something now, which was fine. Let him get strange ideas in his head. “And what is it that you do, Light?”

Light hadn’t taken a bite of his cake yet. Ryuzaki looked down and noticed and gestured towards it with his fork.

“It’s good,” he said. “I made it myself.”

“Oh,” Light said and awkwardly, he put a piece into his mouth. “I’m not usually a cake person. It’s good, though.”

“Yes, it is,” Ryuzaki agreed. “Now, you were saying?”

“I’m a police officer, actually,” Light said. “With you being a PI, we have similar jobs! We ought to compare notes sometime!”

“I’d like to,” Ryuzaki heard himself saying before he could stop himself and this was strange for multiple reasons. One was that Ryuzaki never said things before he thought about them and dissected them first. He was very purposeful that way, so it was strange to say things on impulse alone, following some stupid reactions he had because of Light’s two-faced intrigue.

This was also strange to him because Ryuzaki did not particularly like the police. They were difficult to work with and usually ended up making his job harder.

The third reason why this was strange was because Ryuzaki took a bit of pleasure in being difficult. He was aware that he came off as rude and eccentric and blunt and in truth, he liked it that way. He alienated a lot of people, but that also meant that he didn’t have to deal with them. Part of him relished the mystery that he created by being so aloof and roundabout. If he’d thought for another few seconds, he probably would have found a way to dismiss Light’s proposal as rudely as he could, letting Light know that he really didn’t care about Light’s opinion one way or the other.

But he _did_ care. This impulse told him that. In truth, he wanted to peel away this fakeness he was seeing now and find the car-keying Light, the one who’d watched him methodically until he understood his schedule-a premeditated vandalism. The Light who snickered while he scraped the paint off Ryuzaki’s car door with the sharp end of his house key. This Light who politely ate his cake and offered obligatory laughs at all the right times was hiding someone sort of scheming, someone a little malicious and childish.

Maybe Ryuzaki cared because _he_ was a little scheming and a little malicious and a little childish, too. He and Light just wore different shaped masks.

Light seemed a little surprised that he’d agreed, too. He’d clearly expected some sort of rude dismissal from Ryuzaki as much as Ryuzaki had expected it from himself.

“Alright,” Light said. “You’ll have to let me know about your cases. We can give each other another angle.”

“Absolutely,” Ryuzaki said with a smile and that night, he broke the mirror off Light’s Toyota and left it in pieces on the ground and he grinned to himself, the baseball bat over his shoulder, as he climbed back up the stairs in the dark quietly and passed Light’s door and entered his apartment.


	2. Chapter 2

The next morning, Ryuzaki stood on the porch when Light left his apartment. He was leaning over the railing, sipping a cup of coffee.

Light stepped out of his house and locked the door behind him and then turned around to see Ryuzaki.

“Good morning,” he said, disguising a little bit of surprise. “You’re up early.”

“Never went to sleep,” Ryuzaki replied and then he leaned down to the ground and picked up another cup of coffee in a metal tumbler and then he offered it to Light. “I imagine you take yours black?”

Light, surprised, took the tumbler.

“Coffee?” He asked. “Sometimes I add at least a little sugar.”

Ryuzaki started out at the sunrise over the railing and he reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a little plastic bag full of sugar cubes. He pulled off the lid of Light’s cup and dropped two sugar cubes in and then he pushed the lid back on.

“An extra for good luck,” he said.

“Oh,” Light said. Ryuzaki could feel his eyes on him as he looked out at the sunrise. “Thank you.”

“Of course,” Ryuzaki said. “Have a good day at work. I won’t take your parking spot again.”

“Um, thank you,” Light said again. “Ryuzaki.”

Ryuzaki took a long sip of his coffee as Light descended down the stairs towards his car and he couldn’t stop a smile as he turned to go back into his apartment.

That evening, Light knocked on Ryuzaki’s door to return the cleaned tumbler.

“Light,” Ryuzaki said. “Come in.” 

Light’s face was cold, but he forced a smile and stepped inside.

Ryuzaki put the tumbler away while Light told him about his day. He was calm, collected. It was impressive to Ryuzaki.

Then, he mentioned it.

“Oh, I almost forgot!” He exclaimed, as though this was some sort of funny mishap. “This morning, I found someone hit my side mirror all the way off. They didn’t leave a note.”

“Really?” Ryuzaki said, feigning innocence. To be fair, he feigned it pretty well. He wasn’t as fake through and through as Light was, but he could lie his way around if he had to. However, the fun of it was that Light knew this. The fun of it was that Light could see through it all, in the same way that Ryuzaki saw through him. “Is that an easy fix?”

“I don’t know,” Light said. “But I’m going to see if the apartment complex has cameras in the parking lot.”

Ryuzaki knew they didn’t. That’s part of the reason he could get away with parking wherever he wanted, after all. 

“I hope you catch whoever did it,” Ryuzaki said and then he began to bring out bowls and a few containers of sugar from the cupboards.

“What are you doing?” Light asked.

“Have you ever baked a pie?” Ryuzaki asked.

Light stood up and walked over to the counter to lean across it and watch him pull things down from his cupboards.

“Well,” he said. “No.”

“I’ll teach you,” he said. “Would you get out the measuring cups? They’re in the third drawer-yes, there.”

That evening, they baked a pie. Ryuzaki told Light that he had lived in almost every continent in the world and that his only family was his aging father, which wasn’t 100% true, but oh well. Light told Ryuzaki that he had lived in the area almost his whole life and his family lived nearby. He went for family dinner every Sunday night.

When the pie was done, Ryuzaki cut it in half and put half of it onto a plate and handed it to Light.

“Are you going to make a police report about your car?” He asked and he recognized the spark of something deeper in Light’s eyes when he said that. He recognized it, after all, because it was like a piece of himself. It was scheming, two-timing. Ryuzaki had never been this fascinated with a person before.

“No,” Light said. “No, I don’t think I will.”

“Well,” Ryuzaki and and he smiled. “I hope you find the person who did it.”

That night Ryuzaki spent his time trying to guess Light’s next move. Spray paint? A broken window? A melted welcome mat? He started to try to take measures. He sat in the nook in front of the window all night, sipping his coffee and watching the quiet parking lot. Light never left his house.

That morning, Ryuzaki was asleep with his face pressed against the window. 

The thing was, he almost liked to pretend to himself that he was more than human. He didn’t need sleep, or friends, or healthy food. The truth always came crashing down, however, when he found himself collapsing with exhaustion, or when the sugar started to taste acidic and sour in his mouth, or when he desperately befriended the lying vandalizer next door in an effort to relate to another human being.

Desperate? No, no. That’s not what this was. Ryuzaki was  _ curious _ . He wasn’t lonely. He didn’t want Light as a friend, he wanted him as… As a game piece. He wanted to play this vandalism game as far as he could. It entertained him.

However, he could only stretch the truth so far. He felt something in his heart squeeze painfully when that morning, Light rapped on the window and Ryuzaki jerked awake to see him on the other side of the glass, holding up the tumblers and smiling.

Ryuzaki left his house, leaning against the door, and took the cup from Light.

“Lots of sugar?” Light asked.

“Yep,” Ryuzaki said and he took a sip. The bitterness almost slapped him in the face. It was absolutely sweeter than Light would have ever drank it, but not sweet enough for Ryuzaki. He thought his entire mouth was shrivelling up.

His initial reactions battled inside him. Ordinarily, he would have made a hideous face and pushed the cup back into Light’s hands and insisted that he couldn’t drink liquid poison. Another part of him was fighting now to thank Light. To smile at him and to keep drinking until Light was far enough away that Ryuzaki could pour it out without offending him.

He caged his withering first response and instead smiled at Light, which surprised him.

“Thank you,” he forced himself to say. Light looked pleased with himself.

“Get some sleep,” he told him and Ryuzaki couldn’t tell if the fondness in his voice was a truth or a lie because so much of him wanted it to be a truth that he couldn’t see through his own bias.

Then, he kicked himself as Light walked away.

What was this? Suddenly, Ryuzaki wanted friends?? He never had before! He’d known this guy for maybe three days, four. In which most of what they’d done was wreck each other’s cars and lie to each other in Ryuzaki’s kitchen over an apple pie. And suddenly Ryuzaki was ready to mark him down as a best friend? Did he really want Light to like him that much?! Did he really want  _ friends _ that much?!

In his apartment, Ryuzaki went to the sink to pour out the coffee in the tumbler and clean it for Light. When he did, he found that all his baking ingredients had been stolen.

He started at the cupboards for a ridiculously long time, dumbfounded. They were empty. The very specific places he’d put his sugar, and his flour, and baking powder, and vanilla, every labeled spot was empty. All the while, Ryuzaki had been sitting in the chair in the living room just  _ yards _ away!! Half asleep, but still!

He cursed Light in his head. How?!


	3. Chapter 3

At the police station that morning, Light sipped his coffee through a meeting. It was all he could do not to burst into violent, manic laughter at that very second. He wanted to flip the table he was sitting at. He wanted to jump up on his chair and scream.

‘I stole his stupid cooking stuff right out from under him!’ He wanted to shout. ‘I did! Me! He was in the _room_!’

Instead, he sipped his coffee quietly and allowed himself a small grin.

He was glad to have met Ryuzaki. He was glad to be playing this little game. The truth was, he’d been bored. Police work was more drudgery than he’d ever thought it could be. He wanted to be chasing bad guys down streets at high speeds. He wanted to be undercover in gangs. He wanted to sentence the bad guys to death and triumphantly read them their rights. Instead, he filed a lot of paperwork and heard about a lot of cats stuck in trees. He’d tried to make it more interesting, but not even the little games he played with the police himself had been so entertaining in the end-it was all too easy. No one thought to look through him. No one ever thought he could be capable of the things he was capable of, of the crimes he’d been waving in their faces this whole entire time.

But now, he had this bizarre game to play with Ryuzaki. When he’d come down the stairs that day, confused and a little touched by Ryuzaki’s thoughtfulness, his coffee in his hand, he’d almost screamed out loud when he saw his mirror on the ground.

At first, he’d been hideously irate. He wanted to storm back up the stairs and take Ryuzaki by his stupid shirt sleeves and throw him right off that railing he was leaning on so smugly. After a second had passed, however, he realized what this meant. This was an invitation, not a retribution. Ryuzaki didn’t care about the car. He was inviting him to play this game, to one-up him, to out-vandalize him. He wanted them to destroy each other and then offer up smiles. It was sick. It was _perfect_ . Light had misread him at first. There _was_ more to Ryuzaki than he’d first anticipated.

And besides, something about Ryuzaki was just asking for it. Something about his smugness. His dumb obsession with sugar. The dry tone of his voice, like Light was almost boring to him. The way he’d tried to make Light think he did some sort of illegal things on the side, like that made him look more cool or edgy. It made Light want to punch Ryuzaki right in the teeth, but it also made him want to bake that dumb pie with him and take the other half home and fear eating it all night because he wanted to preserve the perfectness of the moment in which, in all his good parts and his bad parts, he wasn’t alone. Ryuzaki was the perfect enemy and the perfect friend.

This was especially thrilling because it had not gone over Light’s head that Ryuzaki was trans because Light was as well and he’d never really had someone close to him to talk to about it. He was out and he’d been on T for about two years and of course, he’d found a few acquaintances online and he still knew a few people from his college GSA who were also trans, but Light wouldn’t really consider them friends. He just knew them, that was all.

Ryuzaki seemed to be pre-everything but the binder under his thin shirt and the fact that he sported the iconic ‘my chest makes me dysphoric’ shoulder hunch was all unmissable to a trained eye. Plus, he had a very small trans flag forgotten on the dashboard of his car, the car that Light had so famously keyed. Gutsy of him, Light had thought at the time.

He hadn’t brought it up yet. He didn’t know when they would. In truth, he almost didn’t know what he’d say. He tried to picture scenarios in which they bonded over their transness, but he still had trouble picturing it. “And bathrooms,” he pictured himself saying, almost like a bad stand up comedian. “Am I right?” No, no, that was awkward. What about, “the worst part of the day is coming home from work and taking off your binder, right?” Except Ryuzaki hardly ever seemed to take his off, which almost scared Light. He wanted to lecture him on being careful, but he didn’t know how to bring it up.

Back at home that evening, Light stared down the pie on his counter.

The next day was a Saturday and Light rolled over in bed that morning when his phone rang.

He picked it up groggily. An unknown number had texted him.

“I like tennis, too. Come to the park at 11.”

There was only one person it could be. Light had pictures of himself playing tennis on his facebook, so he must have searched that. How did he get Light’s number?? Light felt like this was some sort of power move. How much digging had Ryuzaki done?? Light dragged himself out of bed and dressed and slung his tennis bag over his shoulder.

At the park, Ryuzaki was hitting balls by himself. Light could see him from a mile away and recognized his pronounced slouch. He’d curve his shoulders as he picked a ball up out of his bag, but when he started to hit it against the opposite wall, his back snapped up straight and he swung his racket with admirable form.

Light arrived behind him and watched him in the ball a few more times and when it came his way, he caught it. Ryuzaki turned around, his spine becoming a C again, and he smiled a little at Light.

His stare made Light feel as though he never blinked, as though he had some sort of x-ray vision and was currently staring holes into his skull. He looked exhausted and weak constantly, grey lines under his eyes and a grey, unhealthy pallor to his skin, like he’d just crawled out of his coffin to leer at Light.

“Light,” he greeted him.

“Ryuzaki,” Light said. “How did you get my phone number?”

“The phone book, Light,” Ryuzaki said and Light had never felt dumber faster. Of _course_ he just looked at a phone book. What _else_ could he have done??

“Oh,” Light said and hid the way he was kicking himself behind a smile. “That makes sense.”

“I saw on Facebook that you like tennis,” Ryuzaki said.

“You stalked me on Facebook?”

“Isn’t Facebook there to _be_ stalked? I’m a PI, after all.”

Light dropped his bag on the ground and bent down after it to stretch.

“I guess you’re right,” he said. “So am I to assume I’ve been investigated?”

“You can assume that,” Ryuzaki said. “And you’ve investigated me?”

“Sure,” Light said and he stood up, putting on his friendly and polite smile. “But I guess I wouldn’t call it that. You’re not under suspicion of anything, after all.”

“What did you find?” Ryuzaki asked.

Ryuzaki had a Facebook, but it seemed to Light as though he only had it for business purposes. He used it to let clients get in contact with him. The photo was only the word RYUZAKI in black gothic font and the banner only said PI. It was actually pretty unprofessional.

Other than that, however, Light hadn’t hardly been able to find anything. He didn’t know, after all, what he’d expected to find, especially for someone as strange Ryuzaki, but still.

“Not much,” Light laughed. “Just _your_ Facebook.”

“Oh, good,” Ryuzaki said. “If you ever need a PI, you’ll know where to go.”

“I _could_ just go next door,” Light countered.

“That, too,” Ryuzaki said and then he leaned down and picked up another tennis ball from the bag at his feet. “Will you play a game with me?

Light took the other side of the court and Ryuzaki served first.

He hit _hard_ , almost too hard. The ball whizzed past Light’s head and he could feel the air part around it and rustle his hair and his mouth dropped open.

“You’re supposed to hit it,” Ryuzaki shouted from across the court.

And you’re not supposed to _brain_ me with it, Light thought bitterly and then he took a deep breath and let out a polite laugh.

“You’re right,” he shouted back. “You just surprised me was all!”

You want to play dirty, Ryuzaki? Light thought as he retrieved the ball, something angry in his heart fizzing like mentos in a coke bottle ready to burst. We can play dirty.

He served the ball back just as hard, aiming right for Ryuzaki’s face. From across the court, Light could see something of a grin split across his face and then he stepped back and swung his arm and the racket blasted the ball back at Light.

So he liked this? He wanted a little danger, huh? The fizzing in Light’s heart threatened to burst out of him in bizarre laughter. Was it anger after all? Was it excitement? He couldn’t be sure, but he was ready to play this game if Ryuzaki was. Light wondered with a curl in the corner of his mouth whether or not Ryuzaki was missing his containers of sugar yet.

They hit the ball back and forth and Light lost count of the score, but he had never tried to hit it harder in his life. He had a few welts already under his shirt where Ryuzaki had hit his target and he was sure that Ryuzaki did too, but neither of them said anything about the stinging pain. It was a pride thing.

After the game, when both of them were exhausted and sore and red with welts, they sat together on a set of benches and downed water, both of them drenched in sweat.

“I haven’t had to play that hard in a long time,” Ryuzaki said. “You’re good.”

“You are too,” Light said and it was true. Maybe being able to hit a target hard wasn’t a measure of a good tennis player, but surely it said _something_ and Light was nothing if not covered in welts at this point.

“Thank you for coming out here,” Ryuzaki said once they had both begun to catch their breath. He’d left his hair down through the whole match, but he finally put it up now, raking it out of his eyes and face and tying it away with a black rubber band. Light hadn’t realized just how long it was until he was pulling it back and combing through it with his hands, all flattened with sweat. It nearly brushed the tops of his shoulders, but appeared so much shorter ordinarily because of the way it stood up off his head like the world’s most constant bedhead. When he tied it back, a few pieces fell forward back into his face and he tucked them behind his ears, the strands slicked with sweat.

“Thank you for inviting me,” Light said. “It was going to be a boring Saturday otherwise.”

Light was hit with the realization that he didn’t want to go back home. If they did, they’d both go into their respective apartments and Ryuzaki would plot whatever terrible thing he’d do to Light next, but Light would spend the rest of the afternoon staring at a wall all alone. He’d reorganize his bookshelf or iron all his shirts for the 10th time. He’d rather be using Ryuzaki’s face for target practice. He’d rather be looking into his face and talking to him.

The pie baking night was already the stuff of legend to Light. He’d stored away the memory in his heart delicately and carefully. It was sweet and almost sort of genuine and he could feel Ryuzaki reaching out, desperately. There was something magical about it, the whole thing. Magical even despite the fact that Ryuzaki had somehow smashed off his rearview mirror and that Light had snuck back in that same night and stole all the things Ryuzaki had used to make that night special for him.

He tried not to dwell on that.

There were so many things he could have done to him. Ryuzaki had tried to reach him with food, with the pie and the coffee, and Light had gone back and wrecked the things he’d used to make those gestures.

Something thorny stuck through the fizzy feeling in Light’s heart and Light bit down on his tongue and told himself to stop overthinking it.

Instead, he invited Ryuzaki out to lunch.


	4. Chapter 4

Ryuzaki had not expected to be invited out. They were both drenched in sweat and he wanted to go home and strip off his clothes and lay on the ground with bags of frozen peas on all the spots on his body that Light had hit him with that rock-hard tennis ball with all his might. He knew Light probably felt the same. He squinted at Light through the bright summer sun. What was he planning?? Was this some sort of trick?

That almost made it more exciting. Maybe it  _ was _ a trick. Ryuzaki could only find out if he played along, so he did.

Light suggested that they go home and get cleaned up and then go out to a sandwich place nearby.

They walked home together, their bags over their shoulders, their bodies aching and exhausted, and they didn’t say much, but the silence was almost comfortable.

At the doors, Ryuzaki got a call on his cell phone and he dropped his bag on the porch and answered it.

Light stood in front of his own door, one hand on the knob and the other on the strap on his shoulder, and watched him.

It was Mr Wammy.

“Yes,” Ryuzaki said.

“Ryuzaki,” Mr Wammy said. “I’ve got a case for you in London. It’ll probably only take you a day or two. Can you make a plane right now?”

Ryuzaki tried not to look over at Light and for a split second, he could see the two of them over lunch and Ryuzaki wanted to tell Mr Wammy no. He wanted to spend longer staring at Light’s guarded (dead?) eyes, picking apart the shell around the unbridled crazy deep inside him. He only thought this for a very small second, however, because he realized in the next second how stupid that was and how he was getting a little wrapped up in this whole thing and it wasn’t that serious. So he told Mr Wammy yes.

When he hung up the phone, Light was still waiting patiently to be acknowledged. Ryuzaki put his phone in his pocket and picked up his bag and looked up at Light and reminded himself that this stupid game he was playing with his absolutely unhinged neighbor was not worth it, and he said, “I’m afraid we’ll have to reschedule lunch.”

Light’s facial expressions were an exercise in minute details, as always.

He smiled and asked what came up, but Ryuzaki could see the real bitterness under the words.

“Don’t be too disappointed, Light,” he said. “I’ve got a job and I have to travel right now. I’ll be back soon.”

“Oh,” Light said. “Well, travel safe.”

“Always,” Ryuzaki said and he opened his door and Light still hadn’t gone into his apartment and Ryuzaki looked over at him and then he smiled with a corner of his mouth. “Don’t do anything too crazy while I’m gone.”

Another of the briefest flashes of the real Light, who was angry and wild.

“I told you, Ryuzaki,” he said, his tone playful but warning. “Keying cars isn’t a hobby of mine.”

“Of course it’s not, Light,” Ryuzaki said back. “I never said it was. Anyway, have a good weekend. We’ll have that lunch soon, I promise.”

Then, he stepped inside his house and closed the door.

He wondered as he showered fast, scrubbing the dry sweat out of his hair, what Light would have done over dinner. How much further Ryuzaki would have been able to crack him. If he wasn’t missing out on something he’d enjoy.

In London, Mr Wammy was there with the car to pick him up. He’d gone back and forth between letting his hair dry the way it was, crazy and wild and too long, and tying it back. He wasn’t sure which one would annoy Mr Wammy more.

In the end, he realized that either probably would have gotten him a slap on the wrist.

“You need a haircut,” Mr Wammy said when they were in the car.

“It’s on my calendar,” Ryuzaki said. He’d missed Mr Wammy, but he knew better than to say that outloud. Mr Wammy sighed.

“Are you even  _ trying _ to sound convincing?” He asked. “You’re a better liar than that.”

Ryuzaki watched London pass by through the car window, so familiar and so different from Tokyo.

“How are you and Roger?” Ryuzaki asked.

“You’re changing the subject,” Mr Wammy replied.

“I am,” Ryuzaki said.

“We’re fine,” Mr Wammy said. “Roger says hello.”

“Then I say hello back.”

London passed by him and Ryuzaki fought to keep his neighbor out of his head.

Mr Wammy took Ryuzaki to a swanky hotel room in the city where all his usual materials were already set up, computers and monitors, stacks of files, and a generous assortment of pastries.

Near was waiting for Ryuzaki on the couch, sitting up too straight and staring with wide eyes. They twisted their hair on their finger and pulled at it almost anxiously. They had to be only around thirteen or fourteen years old.

“Near,” Mr Wammy said. “This is Ryuzaki.”

“Good afternoon, Near,” Ryuzaki said, but his eyes were on the cakes on the counter. 

“Good to meet you, Ryuzaki,” Near said quietly. Their voice came out in a whisper.

“Ryuzaki,” Mr Wammy said. Ryuzaki was already at the counter with the cake and was serving himself a thick slice. “Near is top of the leaderboards at the orphanage after Backup.”

The orphanage. Hmm, Ryuzaki thought. 

Ryuzaki had told Light that Mr Wammy was his father when they’d first met. It had been a nearly split-second decision and one that didn’t matter, but it didn’t make it true. It had put something of a thorn in his heart, a spike, and he hadn’t yet been able to remove it. The truth of the matter was that Ryuzaki had spent most of his childhood at the orphanage there in England. But lies didn’t matter, not with Light Yagami. Light Yagami was a human being  _ constructed _ out of lies, a million of them all stitched together into a person. Ryuzaki could stretch the truth all he wanted around someone like Light Yagami. 

This fact didn’t remove the spike sticking out of his heart, though. Did he feel bad for lying? Did he feel bad that it wasn’t true? He wasn’t sure. Hmm, Ryuzaki thought. How obnoxious.

“Congratulations,” Ryuzaki said into his slice of cake, his back turned to Near. He picked up a fork and crammed a strawberry into his mouth and then turned around. Near was still staring, scared stiff. Ryuzaki approached the couch opposite him and climbed over the side to crouch on the cushions. 

“It was Able,” Near said. “And now it’s Backup who’s first. But he didn’t want to come.”

“I see,” Ryuzaki said. In truth, he didn’t care much for keeping up to date with the children in the orphanage that he’d left years before. It was a competitive environment, everyone trying to become the best. Leaderboards and the like. Ryuzaki would participate in the calls Roger and Mr Wammy set up and he’d meet with a few of them every once in a while to help them solve smaller cases, like he was now, but he mostly kept himself out of it. Let Roger and Mr Wammy run this if they wanted to. Ryuzaki was busy and uninterested.

But he tried to be kind to the children. He’d never admit it to anyone, but he did try. It wasn’t something he was good at because he was not usually overly kind to anyone, but well, he knew a little bit about what the kids were going through. And honestly, he didn’t want to make them more miserable than they all already were. Again, not that he’d admit it to anyone. Sympathy and softness was definitively not a part of the reputation he’d developed for himself. If anyone accused him of kindness, he’d prove them wrong and fast.

“Well, Near,” Ryuzaki said, ready to get started. There was a lunch he’d missed in Tokyo and he was a little sore about it, after all. He could still feel the welts from the tennis balls under his shirt, even after the entire day had passed. “What do you have to tell me about this case?”


	5. Chapter 5

Back at home, Light paced angrily in his apartment. He’d showered and put his tennis things away and was now staring blankly at a wall exactly like he knew he would be if he hadn’t invited Ryuzaki out in the first place.

He watched out the window as Ryuzaki, his hair wet and wild around his face, hastily took a stuffed overnight bag to his car and drove away.

Light waited another twenty minutes and when Ryuzaki hadn’t come back, he went out onto the porch and unlocked Ryuzaki’s front door and let himself in.

The thing was, he was justified in doing this. Ryuzaki had done bad things!! He’d parked in his spot and busted up his car and hit him with tennis balls and made him coffee in the mornings and seemed interested in spending time with him and- Light made a face and harrumphed. Alright. Ryuzaki could pretend he liked him all he wanted. Light knew the truth. This was a war to the death. Anything Ryuzaki did and said was a lie to manipulate him and that was just part of the fun of the game. They weren’t really friends. That was the intrigue. Ryuzaki might make him coffee, but he’d scheme behind his back, too. A few stupid little gestures had not redeemed him.

The day that Light had found his mirror on the ground, he’d schemed deeply. He had his own key to Ryuzaki’s apartment, stolen by charming the lady at the front desk into letting him into the manager’s office for a few minutes in which he’d taken a press of the spare key in clay. After all, if he was going to play this game, he was going to play it right. Ryuzaki had started this to begin with by not staying in his spot like he was supposed to because for whatever reason, he felt entitled. Now he better get on Light’s level.

Once inside the apartment, Light didn’t know what he planned to do. Ryuzaki hadn’t attacked back yet and the metaphorical ball was in his court. Light didn’t want to hit too hard while he was ahead, but he was following an instinct by breaking in and he decided to continue following it.

He examined Ryuzaki’s living room deeper. The window seat was the messiest thing there, strewn with a few pillows and blankets. A pad had been laid down on the wood and Light didn’t have a hard time imaging Ryuzaki curled up there, trying to convince himself he wasn’t tired until he finally dozed off like the morning Light had found him there, his face pressed stupidly against the window and his mouth wide open.

His apartment was surprisingly bare, as if it were some sort of hotel room or hospital. He hadn’t refilled his cabinets. He had a few books on a shelf by the TV mounted on the wall, just a few books about detective work and one or two Sherlock Holmes novels, most of which looked dusty and untouched.

A cake sat on the counter under plastic wrap next to the remainder of the pie that he and Light had baked together.

The bathroom was still steamy. Light wandered in, careful not to touch anything. He could smell soap and shampoo lingering faintly in the air. A hairbrush sat untouched on the counter and a bottle of hand soap lay on its side by the sink.

His bedroom was dark and empty as well. There was another, smaller TV, and a bedside table littered with files. On the wall was a pinboard, like the detective movies where they tie red string to pictures of people and clippings from newspapers, but there wasn’t anything there except for a few files pinned up in plastic bags.

The bed was mostly untouched, but the sheets were rumpled in such a way that told Light that Ryuzaki sat on top of the covers to work more often than lay under them to sleep. Light examined all this carefully and then he went back out to the living room and sat down on the window seat. What terrible thing was he going to do here? What awful surprise was he going to leave Ryuzaki?

The cushion by the window was surprisingly soft, and so were the blankets. Light pulled one over his lap and he could still smell Ryuzaki’s shampoo and he rubbed one of the red welts under his shirt and then, he laid down to stare at the ceiling and before he knew it, he was waking up and it was late afternoon and he was still curled up on Ryuzaki’s window seat, surrounded by his fluffy blankets, the makeshift spare key lying on the rug a foot or so away.

Light scrambled to his feet, tripping over the blankets. He hit the ground and then scrambled up. He whirled around to scoop up the blankets and fling them back onto the window and then he grabbed the key and was out the door and back into his own house before he could completely confront what he’d done.

 


	6. Chapter 6

The days that passed while Ryuzaki’s apartment sat empty seemed to stretch on for eternities. This tortured Light not only in and of itself, but also because he was frustrated that he felt so strongly about it to begin with. He was bored without Ryuzaki.

This was part of the reason why, exactly four days later, Light was so angry to find Ryuzaki in the laundry room as though he’d never left.

“I know,” Light heard Ryuzaki’s voice. “I  _ know _ , Wammy, it’s just- Well all my clothes are pink.”

Light stood outside the laundry room and dealt with the bubbling emotions in his heart, gripping his tumbler of coffee in both hands. How long had he been home?? Days, probably. It struck him to hear Ryuzaki’s voice again, which he hated. He’d missed him. He also felt anger. Ryuzaki hadn’t called first thing to tell him he’d gotten back?? He hadn’t bothered to let him know? He’d been waiting for a call. Light felt furious and stupid. Clearly Ryuzaki didn’t care as much to see Light as Light cared to see Ryuzaki.

Light entered the laundry room to find a frustrated-looking and shirtless Ryuzaki staring down a laundry basket of pink clothes. He was holding the phone with one hand, pinched between his fingers, and tugging on the bottom of his binder with the other, the only thing there left white, his back twisted into it’s classic C-shape and his ribs sticking out one by one under his binder.

He looked over when Light entered the room and he took the phone away from his face, despite the fact that it was clear the person on the other end was still talking.

“Looks like you’re in a pickle,” Light said and swallowed the emotions he was wrestling. If Ryuzaki didn’t care, then Light wouldn’t, either.

“I don’t even own anything red,” Ryuzaki replied bitterly.

Light laughed and sipped his drink. Good, he thought. Let him suffer.

“Happens to the best of us,” he finally added. The person on Ryuzaki’s phone was calling his name. Ryuzaki hung up and dropped the phone into the laundry basket.

“I hate this,” Ryuzaki said but he said it with a surprising amount of energy and bitterness and he snatched up the basket and walked out of the laundry room and out into the courtyard, his flip flops smacking the concrete loudly.

“Woah!” Light cried and he followed Ryuzaki. “You’re just in your binder!”

“So?” Ryuzaki said.

“Well, what if someone sees? And recognizes it? They’d know.”

“So?” Ryuzaki added again. 

“No, Ryuzaki,” Light said. “You’re not understanding. That could be dangerous.”

Ryuzaki stopped now, halfway across the grassy courtyard, his laundry basket in his arms.

“You’re right,” he said. “I hadn’t thought about that.”

Light didn’t know what sort of life Ryuzaki had been leading up to this point that allowed him not to think about those kinds of things. It was something he thought about all the time. He thought about it in the bathroom, keeping his head down, a chorus of the words ‘get out’ on repeat in his head and fear in his heart. He thought about it when he confused cashiers at stores, who addressed him as sir and then awkwardly changed to ma’am, apologizing profusely, or vise versa. He thought about it when he walked down the street, feeling like he stood out, feeling like everyone around him _ knew _ . 

He wanted to laugh at Ryuzaki and he wanted to not be worried about him, especially after he’d made it clear that Light had overexaggerated their relationship, but he couldn’t, not with this.

“Well it’s good to think about now,” Light said. “We’d better keep moving.”

Light followed Ryuzaki back into his apartment, where Ryuzaki tossed his laundry basket of pink clothes onto the floor and leapt up onto the couch.

Light stood in the corner.

“Are those all identical white shirts?” He asked, examining the overturned pile.

“They are all identical pink shirts,” Ryuzaki said and he ground his teeth ever so slightly. “I’m very particular about my clothes, Light. This shirt is the most comfortable shirt I’ve ever found, and these jeans are also the most comfortable, so I buy them in bulk. And I just ruined a good portion of them. Housework is a waste of my time.”

Light tried not to look too closely at the window nook in which he’d accidentally took an afternoon nap the other day, but he couldn’t exactly forget about it.

“When did you get back?” He finally heard himself ask and he wanted to punch himself in the face. Dammit! He cried in his head. Stupid! Obvious!

“A few hours ago,” Ryuzaki said and Light stopped.

“Wait, really??” He said. 

“Yes,” Ryuzaki said. “I had no clean clothes left is all. No one to wash them for me.”

Light had never felt stupider in his entire life. He’d assumed Ryuzaki had been home much longer and just hadn’t called. He’d taken a dramatic leap right off an emotional cliff and tortured himself. Was this what it was like to have friends, to  _ enjoy _ someone’s  _ company _ ? If so, then Ryuzaki could keep his friendship, Light didn’t want it. This was too hard, letting someone have his heart on a chain to yank around like this, especially if Light was going to make this sort of assumption-making a habit.

“Oh,” Light said and then he sat down on the couch next to Ryuzaki, digesting this information. “How was your trip?”

“It was fine,” Ryuzaki said. “I saw family in London.”

“And they’re doing well?” Light asked.

“Very well,” Ryuzaki said and he reached down to the coffee table in front of the couch and picked up a piece of wrapped candy from out of a bowl. He unwrapped it carefully with the tips of two fingers. “And how was Tokyo while I was gone?”

“Ordinary,” Light said and forced a friendly laugh. “Just working on cases for work.”

“Which cases would those be?” Ryuzaki asked. He unwrapped another several pieces of candy and started to stack them on the coffee table.

“Well, that bank robbery was pretty recent,” Light said. “You’ve heard of it, I’m sure.”

“I have,” Ryuzaki said.

“The culprit is pretty slippery,” Light said.

“Mm,” Ryuzaki said and his candy tower fell. He scooped up the pieces and dropped them all into his mouth. “Awnd wha awre ywour concluons?” He said with his mouth full.

“Our conclusions?” Light said. “Well, I can’t share anything confidential.”

Ryuzaki swallowed.

“Of course,” he said.

“But from one detective to another,” Light said. “We’re starting to think the perpetrator skipped town.”

Ryuzaki side-eyed Light.

“You don’t actually think that,” he said. “You’re lying.”

Light felt as though the world stopped and dropped a spotlight on him in that very second. Ryuzaki was staring into his very soul with his unblinking eyes. Light was stunned.

Ryuzaki  _ knew _ . He knew. He didn’t just know that Light was lying about believing that the bank robber was gone, but he knew that Light was a little more wrapped up in this case than he’d previously admitted. Dammit, Light thought.  _ Dammit _ .

“I,” Light said and scrambled to recover. “Why would you say that, Ryuzaki?”

“Because it’s true and I wanted to see what you’d do,” Ryuzaki said.

“Well,” Light laughed. In his head, he chanted the word ‘dammit’. “Well, maybe you’re right. I’m not entirely sure if that’s true. But there’s not a lot of evidence, you know.”

“I know,” Ryuzaki said. “I’ve actually been looking at this case as well from the outside.”

“What are  _ your _ conclusions?” Light asked. Ryuzaki hesitated and pulled on his bottom lip while he thought.

“Oh,” he said casually. “Nothing so far.”

You liar, Light thought and seethed. He knows. He knows. He knows.

The thing is, it was all for a good cause! He was redistributing the money to people who actually needed it. It had to be done! And Light was clever enough to do it. 

It was a little funny, how it had all happened. After all, Light was just an ordinary police officer, keeping to himself. Except at the same time, he wasn’t. He’d always known he was special, that, Gatsby-esque, he was a son of God and well, he was just better. Cleverer. More capable.

He’d been keeping an eye on the world for ages. He saw so much injustice, garbage that couldn’t be fixed. So, like any good citizen, he decided he’d do his part to make the world a better place.

Even if that meant orchestrating a large-scale bank robbery to fix poverty in Tokyo.

It was a hobby, a little something on the side, that was all. It had barely even disrupted his boring little life, which was something of a disappointment. This was just another little game with the police, another so called ‘crime’ that sat right in front of their noses. No one was clever enough to stop him. It was a mostly failed game because it was just so damn easy.

“Well,” Light said. “Let me know if you think of anything so we can catch this guy.”

Ryuzaki stood up off the couch and crammed his hands back into his pockets.

“Of course,” he said. “Now, would you like some tea?”

When Light returned to his apartment later in the evening, the first thing he noticed was a strange sound. He stopped and listened closely as the door shut behind him. Was it… A faucet running?

He walked past the living room and into the back and stopped. The bathroom door was on the other end of the hallway, and the rug in front of the door was dark with water. He stepped closer, his mouth hanging open in surprise, and then his foot landed in a growing puddle. He looked down and stepped back, reeling, trying to shake the wetness off his nice dress shoes.

He sloshed down the hall, his shoes in his hand, and reached the bathroom door. He pulled it open and more water came surging out, almost up to his mid-calf. He cried out and jumped, the water freezing.

Inside the bathroom, the toilet, sink, and tub were all full and overflowing. All the faucets were on and the water ran fast. For a second, Light could only stare.

_ This _ was the first thing Ryuzaki had done upon returning home. It was this.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just feel the need to remind everyone that i LOVE misa amane and i really showed a lot of self-control in this chapter by not using the whole thing to fawn over how gorgeous and strong and incredible i think she is so just remember that going into this

The bank robbery was a part of something that Light had been thinking about for a long time and he had a plan. He wanted to make Tokyo a better place. He also wanted something worthy of his attention, something a little challenging. This robbery had been a part of a string of robberies and a few murders that he’d helped orchestrate, mob bosses and the like. It really had turned out to be not such a big deal at all, which had been a colossal disappointment. But it was all a part of the plan. Little by little, he would right some wrongs. He’d change the world.

So it was more than a little ridiculous that the first thing to really ease his boredom was this stupid game he had going on with his stupid neighbor. That said stupid neighbor was the most interesting person he’d ever met in his life.

The next piece of the puzzle was another murder, another mob boss in Russia. Light put them all together from afar. He’d made a few friends in the right places and he covered his tracks well. He’d make the plans and then, they’d happen, that was all. And no one ever caught him. No one ever put it together.

That morning, Ryuzaki was standing on his porch again, sipping his drink, the twitch of his lips undeniably smug.

Light stepped out of his house and closed the door behind him. Ryuzaki leaned down to pick up an extra tumbler and handed it to him, staring out at the parking lot like they’d been doing it for years. Light took it.

“Let’s do lunch when you get back,” Ryuzaki said. “To make up for me having cancelled the other day.”

Light was about to respond, but it was at this same time that Misa Amane pulled into the parking lot in a black limo and stepped out of the backseat. She waved up at Light, grinning.

“Light!” She cried. “I knew I could catch you before work!”

“Oh,” Light said and he did not try very hard to mask the disappointment in his voice.

“Light,” Ryuzaki said next and Light looked over and saw that his eyes were, by some miracle, wider than normal. “Is that Misa-Misa?”

“Yeah,” Light said. “It is.”

Misa bounded up the stairs, her grin big. She was wearing a short black skirt and a ripped band t-shirt with a belt around her waist, forever undeniably stylish. Ryuzaki looked like he wanted to run.

Misa passed Ryuzaki and threw her arms around Light, who wanted nothing more than to not be touched. He stiffened until Misa backed off. They’d _talked_ about this. He frowned.

“Good morning, Light,” Misa said.

“Misa, what are you doing here?” Light said.

“I want us all to go out tonight,” Misa said. “You and me and Matsu and Mochi, you know, everyone! I’m only in town one more night before my tour, you know. I thought I’d stop by to invite you and take you to work!”

“Oh, Misa,” Light said. “I just made plans for tonight with Ryuzaki.” Misa made a face and then followed Light’s eyes to Ryuzaki, behind them. He looked like a deer in headlights. It then occurred to Light that he should let Misa know how to refer to Ryuzaki and quickly went on in order to set the precedent. “ _He_ ’s my friend,” Light said. “We’re neighbors.”

“He can come, too,” Misa said. She stuck her hand out towards Ryuzaki. “Nice to meet you, Mr Ryuzaki!” Ryuzaki glanced at Light, his eyes screaming panic, and then back at Misa and he took her hand to shake it.

“Nice to meet you, Misa Amane,” he said. “I, um, love your latest album. Heaven’s Door. It’s, uh, really good.”

“Thank you!” Misa said. For once, Ryuzaki seemed really thrown off guard, which was surprising to Light. “So you’ll come? The both of you?”

“To what?” Ryuzaki asked.

“Oh, you know,” Misa said. “Dinner and then maybe some parties.”

That was _not_ Ryuzaki’s scene, Light thought. He’d never go for it. If he says no, I can tell Misa we’d already made important plans and neither of us will have to go tonight. Perfect, Light thought.

“Well,” Ryuzaki said thoughtfully and Light celebrated internally. He was saying no! “Alright, I’ll go,” Ryuzaki said and Light nearly dropped his coffee.

“Woah,” he said. “Ryuzaki, are you sure? I mean, you don’t really seem like a party person. And you know, you and me had plans.”

“We can postpone them further,” Ryuzaki dismissed him with a wave of his hand and Light ground his teeth.

“Awesome!” Misa cried.

“Ryuzaki, I really think-” Light said.

“If you don't want me to meet the other people in your life, could it be that you don't actually consider __us friends?” Ryuzaki said and he took a sip of his coffee. Light blanched. Misa turned around and slapped Light’s arm.

“Light, how rude!” She cried.

“No, no,” Light said. “I didn’t say that. That’s not what I meant.” And you knew it, Light thought bitterly and Ryuzaki looked into his eyes and smiled as he sipped his coffee.

“You _have_ to come now, Ryuzaki,” Misa said. Light screamed in his head.

“I mean, of course you do, Ryuzaki,” Light said. “The other guys from the police force would love to meet you.” Ryuzaki! He cried in his head. Is it not obvious to you how miserable this will be!?

“I can’t wait,” Ryuzaki said.

Light accepted a ride to work from Misa only because she insisted. He’d talked to her multiple times about this stuff. He was asexual _and_ aromantic and he was not interested in dating her. He did not want her hugging him or grabbing his hand. At this point, he sometimes wondered if she just did it to get on his nerves. Surely she didn’t actually like him _that_ much. He’d been certain to never give her any reason to and it was so painfully obvious that Matsuda wanted to ask her out.

In the car, the driver merged onto the highway and Misa asked about Ryuzaki.

“He seems nice,” she said. “A little odd.”

“He is,” Light said. Odd, yes. Nice? Hmm.

“How long have you guys been friends?”

“A few weeks maybe,” Light said.

“You don’t think you’d date him, do you?” Misa asked. Light groaned.

“We talked about this,” he said.

“I know, I know,” Misa said and Light knew she meant well. “It’s just, there’s something about him that seems a lot like you.”

Light looked at her in bewilderment.

“What about him could possibly seem like me?” Light said. Misa looked back and shrugged.

“Well, I dunno. He seemed a little…” She thought for a minute. “I guess stubborn is the word. He was teasing you about dinner tonight. It was like you two had some sort of secret language.”

“I think you’re overestimating him,” Light grumbled.

“Maybe,” Misa said and she crossed her legs and flipped her hair over her shoulder. “But that doesn’t mean that you two didn’t have a hundred conversations right in front of me with just your eyes. Anyone could see that.”

“What does that even mean,” Light muttered.

Work was work. Light sat around and thought about the guy in the Russian mob who was about to go down tonight and his coworkers talked about the bank robbery and Misa. He mostly wasn’t listening, doodling circles on a pad of paper at his desk while they talked.

“I’ve heard it’s about L,” someone said. “That meeting we’re going to have.”

“What about him?” Someone else said.

“I heard he wants to join the case.”

Light looked up.

“What did you say?” He said.

“There’s gonna be a special meeting tomorrow,” Matsuda told him. He was sitting on his own desk, swinging his legs. Ide and Aizawa stood next to him, talking. For someone who complained about Matsuda so much, Light thought, Aizawa sure talked to him a lot. “I heard from your dad. And I heard from some other folks that L’s going to be there and the meeting is about him joining the case.”

“Why would L join this case?” Light asked.

“Well, it’s just a rumor,” Aizawa said and glared at Matsuda. “From a notorious gossip.”

Matsuda looked a little sheepish.

“I’m naturally curious,” he defended himself. “But anyway, a lot of money was stolen with almost no trace. If I was L, I’d be interested, too.”

Light’s stomach flopped. _L_. He’d never worked with him before, but he’d heard all the stories. That he was brilliant, too brilliant. That he could crack a case in an instant without even leaving his hiding spot.

L could be an interesting challenge-or he could be Light’s undoing.

Light mentally went through all the aspects of the robbery. Everything seemed secure. He should be virtually untraceable. He, of course, was never actually there. He had been at dinner with his family at the time. And he’d taken all sorts of precaution to make sure he was never found. L couldn’t find him. He just couldn’t.

Light thought about this all day until Misa’s cars arrived at 5. She bounded inside, always a constant stream of energy, and made a bee-line for Matsuda, who was getting water. Light watched her attack him from behind and wrap her arms around his waist. They laughed and talked together energetically.

“I think we should try out that new place,” Misa said to him, her hand still on his arm. Matsuda’s entire face was bright red. “The one on main street.”

“The one that just opened up?” Matsuda asked. “I’ve heard all about it!! The reviews are awesome!”

“I know, right?” Misa cried. Light watched them, lazily straightening up his desk, until Misa looked up at him.

“Oh, Light,” she said. “I almost forgot! Your friend Ryuzaki is already in the car. He’s waiting for you.”

Ryuzaki sat in the back and had clearly made himself comfortable, like he was used to being chauffeured. Light opened the door to see him, his long legs stretched out in the aisle instead of folded up in front of him, staring at the ceiling. He looked over when Light opened the door. They stared each other down for a few seconds.

“Move your legs,” Light finally said bluntly and Ryuzaki did.

Light slid into the seat next to him. The rest of the crew was somewhere behind him, still pulling off their suit jackets lazily and chatting.

“Misa is absolutely delightful, Light,” Ryuzaki said. It’s like they were past friendly hellos and small talk and straight into a more comfortable territory. Light forced himself to be civil about Misa.

“She’s a really well-meaning person,” he said casually. He’d expected Ryuzaki to put his feet up eventually, but he never did. The seats in the car weren’t exactly conducive to it, after all. It was almost stranger now to see him sitting ordinarily than it was to see him in his usual crouch. “Do you actually like her music?”

“Yes, of course,” Ryuzaki said and he looked at Light as if he were shocked that Light would even ask. “Don’t you?”

“Not really my thing,” Light said.

“Then how did you end up meeting her?” Ryuzaki asked. “It’s a little unusual that you’re friends with a pop star. I would never have guessed.”

“She came in to report an incident of stalking once and just hit it off with some of the guys at the station,” Light said. “She and Matsuda are practically best friends at this point. She just really needed some friends, I think.”

“Strange situation,” Ryuzaki said.

You said it, Light thought. The rest of the crew started to climb into the car now and Ryuzaki stared forward blankly, pushing on his bottom lip with his thumb, and Light looked at him and thought about how Misa had said that they were alike. That they’d had a hundred conversations in a second with just their eyes. Light supposed it was a little true. There was something that felt right to sit next to him and to talk to him, like something in Light’s life had clicked into place just a little further. It was fabulously rosy. The feeling made Light wanted to slash his tires and light his house on fire. He wanted to absolutely demolish him. He allowed himself to break into a small smile as the car started and his whole heart burned devilishly just thinking about it.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you can make sense of this pls contact me. halfway through i forgot how to read so idk what it says  
> also id like to remind the jury that both l and light have canonically been infected by stupid idiot syndrome and tragically there's no cure  
> also also, actually important info, i posted this like a week ago for a few hours and then took issue w some characterization that id been fighting myself on, rewrote it, and am posting it again, so if you think you've read this before, think again. ive got some new nonsense to share.

Parties were _not_ Ryuzaki’s scene even a little bit. If Mr Wammy had seen Ryuzaki here, he would have thought there was a gun to his head, or the promise of an especially elaborate cake behind closed doors. There was neither. Just Ryuzaki’s neighbor to spite. And embarrass. And spend time with.

Light had introduced Ryuzaki to each of his coworkers and Ryuzaki noticed that he went out of his way to make sure they knew to call him ‘he’, which Ryuzaki appreciated. The more he lived outside of isolated hotel rooms and within the sight of others, the more he realized that he confused people and that they often didn’t know what to make of him, especially gender-wise. He was starting to understand Light’s panic in the courtyard the other day. He’d entered the bathroom at a supermarket that same day only to be followed by a lot of staring eyes and whispers. In his mind, he remembered Light’s words. _It could be dangerous._  Of course, it was ridiculous to assume that he wasn't aware of these kinds of things going into this-he was. He was reclusive, not out of touch. But that was just it-he spent so much time with just himself and Watari, he was unused to being afraid in public.

They’d had dinner at an expensive restaurant on Main Street. The table had gotten a little stiff with surprise when Ryuzaki had climbed into his seat and sat down, frog-like. Light coughed loudly, tactful, and asked what everyone wanted for appetizers. The table snapped awkwardly back into conversation and Light leaned over.

“Ignore them,” he said.

“It doesn’t bother me, Light,” Ryuzaki said back. “I expect it.” He didn’t tell Light that a part of him even relished it. He liked to put people off their guards.

That was one difference between him and Light, he mused. Light was the same as him inside, just as untamed and spiteful and unusual, but he was absolutely married to social norms. He smiled and laughed politely and made small talk about the weather, but Ryuzaki was absolutely sure that inside, he was raging at all times. It’s almost funny, Ryuzaki thought. We are exactly similar and exactly opposite.

If I had lived Light’s life, would I have turned out just like him?

The dinner was fine. A few of Light’s coworkers tried to chat with Ryuzaki, but Ryuzaki was not overly friendly and he wasn’t a great conversationalist, so most of the conversations trailed off. Instead, he talked to Light.

Light reminded Ryuzaki a little bit of a pressure cooker, that there was intense heat bubbling inside him and that at any time, the lid could explode off and scalding water would fly everywhere, but until then, he appeared normal and contained and safe. Ryuzaki liked to try his luck, liked to push on that lid a little bit and see if he got burned. So far, he’d gotten a scraped up car, some stolen ingredients, and some welts the size of tennis balls, but he wanted to know how far Light would go. Where was the line?

Over dinner, he and Light talked about anything and everything. Light swallowed half of his first-instinct answers with polite laughs, but Ryuzaki didn’t care. He’d get it out of him one day. They talked about police work and injustice and tennis and chess and their schooling and they didn’t stop. He caught Misa-Misa looking at them a few times from where she sat across the table with an energetic young man, trading bites off each other’s plates. She’d smile like she knew something every time Ryuzaki caught her eye.

Light hadn’t yet mentioned the flooding in his apartment. Ryuzaki wanted to know what he thought. Was it too much or too little? Did it do any lasting damage? Ryuzaki hoped so. At the rate they were going, neither of them were getting their security deposits back. Was his not mentioning it a way to play with Ryuzaki’s mind? Was it a power move? Or was he embarrassed that he now was not the only one with a stolen key to the other’s front door?

Dinner came and went and it was tolerable, more than tolerable with Light there. The clubs Misa insisted they come with her to afterwards was much, much less tolerable.

Ryuzaki had been in a club once in his whole life. It had been for a case. He was undercover, a little bit like he was now, and he had been looking for someone. He only ever went undercover if he felt as though the situation truly required him to be on the scene and that there was information there that only he could find or things that he needed to see with his own eyes. That club experience had been wholly miserable, with people who wouldn’t stop bumping against him or touching him and once or twice, a few drunk men had called him ‘baby’ and catcalled him, which infuriated him. This club wasn’t super different. It was loud and dark and smelled like sweat. Ryuzaki very much liked to be clean. He bathed and washed his hair every day meticulously and he sometimes washed his hands so much, his skin cracked, but the second he stepped inside, he felt filthy. He wanted to scrub every inch of his body, like the darkness and the grime and sweat from every corner of the building had spread to him like an infection. The sensation possessed him, like a rat scratching at the corner of his brain.

Light seemed to notice Ryuzaki stiffen beside him when they stepped inside because he put a hand on his back and pushed him a little further, not unharshly. He snapped up straight with a jerk once Light’s fingers touched him, a wholly involuntary response.

“ _I_ was trying to tell her no, if you’ll remember,” Light was saying discretely to Ryuzaki as this was happening and at this time, Ryuzaki felt a lot of things at once.

The first thing Ryuzaki felt was in response to Light’s touch and it was the distinct impression that electricity had been shot through his entire body. Light took his hand back quickly to Ryuzaki’s despair when he flinched so obviously. It must seem to Light like Ryuzaki didn’t want to be touched, but it couldn’t be more opposite. In fact, it was in that second, Ryuzaki had realized that he couldn’t remember the last time someone had touched him. He wanted to turn around and tackle Light to the ground just to feel the solidness of his body, like someone else in the world was finally real. He wanted someone to wrap his arms around him and squeeze him. He wanted the warmth of someone else to tell him that he was real, too. He wanted someone else’s skin to touch his. He stared forward, his eyes practically bugging out of his head, thinking about the electricity that had just gone through him.

The second thing that Ryuzaki felt was that Light expected him to regret coming here and regret egging him on. He expected this experience to prove to Ryuzaki that Light had been right all along. Instantly, Ryuzaki was determined to prove him wrong. They would have fun here, damn it, and they would have fun because Ryuzaki was _always_ right. I can lie, too, you know, Ryuzaki thought. And I’m not here to lose.

“Sorry,” Light said when he pulled his hand back and his cocky attitude withered a little. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

The war between Ryuzaki and his first impulse was usually a war already lost-he wasn’t known for his astounding self control. So although he knew he might regret it, he said, “I wasn’t scared. I just realized I can’t remember the last time someone touched me.”

The one good thing in all this was that painful honesty was usually one of the only things that threw off Light “I’m Made of Lies” Yagami and it worked it’s usual magic this time. He made a face like Ryuzaki had just ran through the streets naked instead of simply stating a fact.

“Oh,” he said awkwardly. “I, uh, I’m sorry to hear that.” He didn’t seem to know how to respond. Honesty was a level of intimacy, like most other levels of intimacy, that Light Yagami avoided at all costs. Ryuzaki decided that he wanted, one, to push his luck with the honesty thing and see how far he could bend Light until he snapped and two, he wanted to have fun in this club purely out of spite.

And three. He wanted to continue being touched.

It seemed that people in clubs danced and drank and that was about it, so that’s what Ryuzaki decided to do. He began to devise a plan in order to have each of the three things he wanted. He took a few steps further into the club, his spine sinking back into his comfortable slouch and his hands crammed into his pockets, and then turned back and looked at Light, who was standing behind him stiff as a board, his suit jacket slung over one arm. Ryuzaki wanted to laugh. The tables were already turned-Light was already just as uncomfortable as he’d thought Ryuzaki would have been.

“Do you dance?” Ryuzaki asked.

“You’re going to dance?” Light asked back and there was a disbelieving smugness in his voice that only Ryuzaki could have heard. Something about that thought reminded Ryuzaki of his rule about being undercover. Only _he_ could detect all the nuances in Light’s words, all those minute details so crucial to their conversations in his guarded eyes. Ryuzaki _had_ to be there, _had_ to be on scene, _had_ to be undercover because he was the only person in the world who could peel away all of Light Yagami’s skin until he found what was underneath. He felt a swell of something in his chest. Pride, maybe? No, no, not exactly. No it was…

It was the end of loneliness, he realized like a brick to the face. It was a broken bone healing. It was the ecstatic absence of pain in a place where only pain had ever been. His heart lurched and he wanted to scream and cry and vomit all at the same time. He wanted to reach forward and grab Light by his shirt and shake him, just to feel the realness of him. He wanted to hit him just to reassure himself that he was really there, that he was solid and present. In fact, he nearly did.

Instead, he held himself back and congratulated himself on his self-control and said, “I am going to dance and you are, too.”

This, naturally, launched them both into competition.

Ryuzaki had never danced like the people in the club were. Actually, they were mostly spinning and twisting and jumping together. Mr Wammy had gotten Ryuzaki dance lessons once he quit tennis in order to encourage him to become well-rounded and Ryuzaki hadn’t loved it, but he wasn’t bad at it, either. He didn’t really know what he was doing in this situation, but he knew he could get the hang of it quick.

Light started to follow him and Ryuzaki took the initiative, his stomach twisting, to reach forward and grab both of Light’s hands once they reached the dance floor. Light allowed this with only a small grumble about how freezing his fingers were and only let go for a second to toss his jacket over the side of a nearby chair. Ryuzaki didn’t ordinarily feel fear, but he did in the moment that he reached forward for Light’s hands, the tragic knowledge of the fact that he hadn’t been touched in so long and the electricity that had struck him earlier in the front of his mind. He was scared because Light could have shook his hands off of him or added it to the long list of things that Ryuzaki did wrong in social situations. He also knew that he was scared of how much he wanted this, that he felt for an instant there that if someone didn’t put their hands on him soon, he might fall over dead.

With Light’s hands in his, Ryuzaki began to dance. He took them through a little back and forth first, something of a modified salsa, and Light followed, clearly a little out of his element.

“Move your hips,” Ryuzaki instructed loudly over the music. “And your shoulders!”

Light tried. Ryuzaki stifled a laugh and then tried to spin him, but Light didn’t know what to do and he stumbled, so Ryuzaki pulled him back in to recover.

“You’re losing,” he said.

“It’s not a competition,” Light said. Ryuzaki’s smirk grew.

“Of course it is,” he said and then, following Ryuzaki’s example, Light spun him and then, Ryuzaki couldn’t help but laugh.

“Wow,” Light said stiffly once Ryuzaki had turned back around. “You’ve never done that before.”

“What, laugh?” Ryuzaki said.

“I guess,” Light said.

“Must be because you’re not particularly funny.”

Ryuzaki continued teaching Light the basics, walking him through different steps and spins and things to do with his hands and shoulders and he realized that although they probably looked a little silly and stiff, he was actually having… Fun?

Another, faster song came on and they followed it, looking like a mess, but Light was starting to crack a smile. Misa and the young man she’d eaten dinner with approached them from behind and Misa slipped in-between Light and Ryuzaki and took Ryuzaki’s hands and spun him away. Behind them, Ryuzaki could see Light and Misa’s friend floundering in an attempt to successfully switch partners.

“You’re good!” Misa yelled over the music.

“So are you!” Ryuzaki yelled back. He was definitely nervous to be dancing with her-after all, she was one of his favorite musicians and he frequently made bad impressions. And he did not frequently find himself in clubs dancing with people. But she _was_ a good dancer.

“I wanted to tell you!” She yelled. “Light’s never been like this with anyone else!”

“Like what?”

“Like… Friendly! He’s been very lonely!”

“How do you know that?”

Misa shrugged, her dyed hair slipping over her shoulder. This was surreal, it occurred to Ryuzaki. It was like a very bizarre dream. He was at a club dancing with Misa-Misa and making friends. It was like some sort of alternate universe. Mr Wammy would be absolutely floored.

“I’m very intuitive!” She said. “But I like Light. I think you’ll be good for him!”

Ryuzaki wanted to find a good time to ask Misa-Misa for a signature or something, but Light was returning, him and Misa’s friend dancing awkwardly, and Light switched with Misa again and snatched up Ryuzaki’s hands.

“Matsuda is not very interesting,” he said dryly and Ryuzaki could barely hear him over the blare of the music and the fact that he had actually been having fun all night and that he felt like he’d won the competition and that he had a friend. He wasn’t alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> am i embarrassed that i dont know how people dance in clubs? no. ive never known shame.


	9. Chapter 9

Life for Ryuzaki was defined by cases. They ran back to back with no breaks in between, and he often worked on multiple at once. Nothing had ever made him happier, but he was a little overdue for it as of late. He hadn’t done as much work as usual. He was becoming distracted. For once, he’d found something that was almost more interesting than a case. Almost.

It wasn’t  _ entirely _ his fault, though. The case he was on now was a little unordinary. It involved a lot of waiting. He solved smaller cases in the meantime, but for now, he was undercover, waiting to see something, waiting to stumble on the minute details he’d need to notice in order to pick this one apart. It didn’t mean he wasn’t working on it, of course. It just meant that sometimes, there wasn’t a lot to be done except for wait as the other person on the other end of this case made their move and see what that move uncovered. He had to keep his ear to the ground as it were and given that this was the case, talking to neighbors and establishing a false “normal” and going to parks, clubs even-it wasn’t a bad idea. It wasn’t  _ un _ productive. If anything, this was what he should be doing. But he’d about had enough.

So on Monday after the club, Ryuzaki had his meeting with the police about the bank robbery case and he was excited to stop doing so much waiting.

Mr Wammy had flown in to introduce him and Ryuzaki kicked back in his apartment in front of his computer and smugly dropped one sugar cube after another into his cup of coffee. The blinds were drawn and he was crouched on the couch, his laptop propped up on the table in front of him.

Through the cameras, he could see the Tokyo police force. He leaned into the screen and squinted. Not him… Not him… Not him… Ah! There he was. The light brown hair, meticulously tailored tan suit. And of course, he was sitting back in his chair, his arms and legs crossed tightly. He looked bored, even condescending. Ryuzaki smirked a little at the screen. That was him.

Finally, Mr Wammy introduced him and Ryuzaki pressed the microphone button on his earpiece and spoke.

“Hello,” he said and he could hear the computer mangle the sound of his voice through the police’s speakers. “I am L.”

He watched on the screen as Light shifted a little. He looked around himself to gauge the reactions of the rest of the police force around him. What was he thinking?

“I’m interested in this case in part because the culprit was able to vanish with so much money, but also because I have reason to believe that the individual behind this robbery is behind various other large-scale robberies and homicides.” Ryuzaki listed a few of the offenses.

The people on his screen all began to shift and turn to each other and whisper. Light, however, became unnaturally stiff. Hiding something. Ryuzaki wished he could see his face.

The thing was, Ryuzaki had had his eye on Light ever since meeting him. It had seemed a little, maybe coincidental was the word, but Light’s astounding arrogance fit the profile of someone who would pull a stunt like this. And Ryuzaki was at this apartment complex for a reason, after all. It  _ had _ to be someone here, so why not Light?

He hadn’t considered the theory  _ too _ carefully yet. After all, it was a slow-moving case. He needed more info. The other person needed to make their move. If it was Light, he’d find out eventually. Until then, he was lying in wait.

The police force presented him with some of their additional information, mostly things he’d already heard or put together himself. 

The Tokyo bank had been robbed a month ago at 1am. It was a very, very clean job. Almost too clean. The security cameras had been hacked in order to show only empty halls during the entirety of the robbery, and none of the alarms had been triggered. It was almost as though the money had just… vanished.

Ryuzaki had picked up on the pattern. A bank in the US had been robbed the same way, and then another bank in the UK. Sprinkled in between these were various murders and Ryuzaki was frustrated to admit that he couldn’t say exactly how many. But he knew there were at  _ least _ twenty, all members of the mob or particularly corrupt politicians. They were all killed in varying ways, from a clean sniper shot across a street to poison in a cup of tea. But the high profiles of the victims and their dark track records linked them together, along with the fact that the murders had been seemingly committed by no one, just like the robberies.

It was as though the culprit had a calling card and that card was… Absolutely nothing.

Ryuzaki had begun to piece together things about this culprit. They were devastatingly clever and they knew it. They felt as though they were doing good. Either that or they wanted power. Maybe both. Ryuzaki thought sometimes that if he just left them alone, they’d get cocky or lazy enough to screw up, out of arrogance or out of the desire to play games or to be recognized, and then Ryuzaki would jump on them. After all, they’d gone totally undetected for nearly, what was it, a year? A little more? It wouldn’t be a long waiting game until they forgot themself for a minute and Ryuzaki would be ready.

Additionally, Ryuzaki had a lot of ‘friends’ in a lot of places, most of them less than upstanding, and one of them had recently settled a debt with him by trading information. She’d recently been contracted, third-hand or fourth-hand or more, to hack security cameras in a bank. She’d insisted on speaking to the person at the heart of the operation and this individual had contacted her from Tokyo, late at night, and she’d traced it back to this area.

She’d turned down the job because she had been under the impression that if she’d taken it, Ryuzaki would have turned her in. This, of course, wasn’t true, and he’d been frustrated. If she’d said yes, he’d have had a spy on the inside. Now, if the culprit really was clever, they’d never contact her again. His link was lost. 

But he still had the info.

So his conclusion had been (and he would ride it out until new information convinced him otherwise) that the culprit lived here and hadn’t expected to be tailed by her. That this assumption had been one of those stupid mistakes, one of the ones that Ryuzaki had been waiting for.

“So for that reason,” Ryuzaki said and he picked up his cup of coffee, his free hand on the button on his earpiece. “I’ll be taking the case from you. Thank you for everything you’ve done so far.” He sipped his coffee.

The police erupted into loud talking and exclamations. Ryuzaki sat back and then, he watched Light stand up. He waved his hands, leaderlike, until his co-workers around him settled down and then he leaned over the table towards the giant letter L that Ryuzaki knew was projected onto a screen in front of him.

“L,” he said loudly enough to be heard. “Sir.” Ryuzaki stifled a laugh at the bitterness in that word and the way he had to force it out of himself. “With all due respect, my team and I are in the area.”

“I’m in the area as well,” Ryuzaki said. “And I’m taking the case. I can handle it by myself. Thank you, though.”

The room began to buzz a little again. Ryuzaki heard a few exclamations about how it was unfair.

Ryuzaki was about to say goodbye and shut off his cameras until Light spoke again.

“So we didn’t know about the rest of the crimes!” He cried. “But we’re Tokyo-specific police, it’s unreasonable to expect us to consider seemingly unrelated world-wide crime. And you don’t seem to have any proof.”

“I’m not expecting you to have considered it,” Ryuzaki said. “I was just sharing my conclusions. You’re right, all of you. It’s not fair. It’s not fair to ask you to take on a case that’s not specific to Tokyo. That’s exactly why I’m taking it off your shoulders.” He thought for a second and then added. “And I’m afraid you’ll just have to take my word for it. My proof is classified.”

“Let at least a portion of us work with you,” Light continued stubbornly. The rest of the police had gone silent now and were watching him, stunned. “The last crime on that list was committed here-surely there’s something we can contribute given that fact. And we’ve been pouring work into this case.”

Ryuzaki didn’t answer for a minute. Light was stubborn, which of course, Ryuzaki knew. And he seemed to want this case badly.

Light put his hands down on the table he was leaning so far across, steadying himself. He and the rest of the police stared into his camera anxiously.

Finally, Ryuzaki responded.

“I’ll consider a portion of you to work with me,” he said. “But until then, please focus your energies elsewhere. Thank you for your time.”

Light was still frozen over the table by the time Ryuzaki shut off the camera. He snapped his laptop closed and leaned back on the couch, his coffee nearly forgotten during his fight with Light. How exciting this was, that Light didn’t even know it was him! 

He’d wait a little while, let Light simmer, before sending him an email inviting him to join him. He’d give him a few hours to be angry.

And Light was definitely angry. He burst into Ryuzaki’s apartment as soon as he got back and threw down a file onto the counter in front of where Ryuzaki sat on the couch. Hmm, thought Ryuzaki, a little irritated. Are we good enough friends now that you can walk in here without knocking? Funny. I’ll remember that.

“Look at this,” Light said and his voice was hiding barely contained rage. “Look.”

Ryuzaki picked up the file that he already knew was his official letter to the police to give up the case, but before he could pretend to read it, Light continued.

“L has taken it,” he said. “Took the case from us.”

“Is that so,” Ryuzaki said. Light sucked in a breath.

“I’m angry,” he said and his rage was barely contained.

“I can tell,” Ryuzaki replied.

That night, Ryuzaki sent the email, encrypted. He would have waited a little longer, but Light really had been stewing all day and Ryuzaki had had to hear all about it and he was sick of it. This is what the email said.

Light Yagami, 

I've been made aware of some of your work with the NPA and the police force. It impresses me. I would like you and only you to work the bank case with me. Reply within 24 hours and then destroy the computer you’ve received this on . 

-L. 


	10. Chapter 10

Ryuzaki stepped outside of the house the next morning as Light was putting a sledgehammer through his computer in the parking lot.

He drapped himself over the metal banister and licked cake frosting from breakfast off his finger and watched Light destroy his own laptop and tried not to snicker.

“What are you doing?” Ryuzaki asked loudly enough for Light to hear. Light looked up and there was fire in his eyes. Ryuzaki started down the stairs.

“Following the orders of an asshole,” Light replied and he gave the laptop another good smash. Ouch. If it wasn’t so funny, Ryuzaki might have been a little offended.

Ryuzaki reached where he stood on the concrete and peered at him from under his hair.

“And who might that be?” He asked.

“L,” Light said. “You know, the detective.”

“I know.”

There was an anger in Light that reminded Ryuzaki of the last time they stood in this parking lot together. Light ground his teeth and lifted the sledgehammer again.

“He probably thinks he's so much better than me,” Light said and smashed the computer. He was so angry. Ryuzaki was actually sort of surprised-he’d have thought Light might even be a little excited.

Then again, maybe he wasn’t sure how Light would react. He just knew he’d get a reaction and that’s what he wanted.

“What makes you think that?” Ryuzaki asked.

“He’s just so… smug.” Light said and he dropped the hammer and started to scoop up the bits of his broken computer. “And I’m just a police officer who talked back to him. He wants to mock me, that’s what this is.”

“What _is_ this?” Ryuzaki said casually, like he didn’t know.

Ryuzaki knew he had to watch his words. He was in a very interesting situation right now and he shouldn’t blow it until he was ready. He had a leg up here and he ought to use it well. But at the same time, he could probably say a _lot_ before Light put two and two together. People were more prone to think that he wasn’t L than that he was. He was always way too strange, way too young, way too queer even. In considering who L might be, Ryuzaki slipped pretty far under the radar every time and it never failed to either make him laugh or make him indescribably angry.

“I fought him at that meeting yesterday,” Light admitted, the pieces of his computer in his hands. Ryuzaki followed him to the dumpster. “And insisted that he let us stay on the case and he finally agreed that he’d let a few of us stay.” They reached the dumpster. Light’s hands were full. He looked at Ryuzaki to help him open the dumpster.

“Don’t like to get my hands dirty,” Ryuzaki said dismissively. Light rolled his eyes and dropped the pieces and opened the lid himself and threw the pieces inside.

“So he emailed me and says only I’ll stay on. It’s a power move. He’s mocking me.”

“Maybe he was impressed by you.”

“Pfft. Sure. That’s not how assholes like him work.”

“How are you sure he’s an asshole?”

“I’m sure,” Light said.

Ryuzaki followed him back to the other side of the parking lot, where Light reached down to pick up the sledgehammer he’d left.

“But how?” Ryuzaki pressed.

Light held the hammer in his hands and took a breath. He was pulling all his emotions back into himself, putting on his front.

“I’m…" He started and then he pressed his lips together and collected himself. He laughed a little weakly. “Maybe you’re right. I’m making snap judgements.”

Aw, come on, Ryuzaki thought. Where’s that good old fashioned Light Yagami-brand righteous rage?? It wasn’t that Ryuzaki cared whether or not Light thought he was an asshole-after all, he _was_ and he knew it. He just wanted to understand his thoughts, see the reactions he’d provoked out of him.

And besides, was Light really not even a _little_ excited to work with him? Was he not impressed with him a little??

“I didn’t say that,” Ryuzaki said. “I just asked what about him came off to you that way.”

They stood in the parking lot and Light held the sledgehammer in his hand that he’d used to destroy his laptop because Ryuzaki had insisted that he do it and the sun was rising in front of them and Ryuzaki watched the orange light paint his face and hair.

Light sighed and started back towards the staircase. Ryuzaki followed, his hands in his pockets and his back curved as usual, a contrast to Light’s painfully straight posture.

“For one,” Light started. “Is just his position. He’s never had to do a single hard thing in his life and he’s drowning in money. You know someone like that thinks he’s better than everyone else to begin with.”

Not so far off, Ryuzaki thought.

“For two is the way he talked to us. Like we weren’t worth his time. Ugh. For three is asking me to buy a new laptop. I’m not made of money.”

“I’m sure if you told him it mattered that much to you, he’d get you a new one. If he cares so much to keep you on the case, after all.”

Light rolled his eyes and continued.

“And fourth, of course, is this stunt. I’m staying on and only me? It’s a punishment. He wants to make me regret arguing with him, humiliate me. It’s petty and mean.”

“And you really don’t think there’s any way at all that it could be because he liked you?” Ryuzaki asked again. They were at the top of the stairs now and Light leaned the hammer against the wall by his front door and rolled his eyes.

“Stop defending him. A guy like this doesn’t respect anyone else,” he said. “Especially not someone who fights with him.”

“Maybe _only_ someone who fights with him,” Ryuzaki said and he wanted to laugh. If only Light knew!! But of course, if Light knew, he wouldn’t think it was so funny.

Light folded his arms and looked out at the sunrise and then he looked back over at Ryuzaki.

“What makes _you_ so sure,” he asked. “It’s not like you know L.”

“You’re right,” Ryuzaki said. “But I’m profiling him. Putting myself in his shoes, as it were. Trying to get you to actually think about this.”

“Profiling, huh?”

“Well, you try it,” Ryuzaki said. “Tell me what someone like him must be like.”

“I just did.”

It was Ryuzaki’s turn to look at the sunrise and he was quiet for a moment.

“Tokyo sure has beautiful sunrises,” he said. “I kind of like the pollution. Aesthetically.”

“Guy like him must be pretty lonely,” Light said.

“Oh?” Ryuzaki said, his eyes trained on the sky.

“Maybe you have a point. That he’d only respect someone who’d have the guts to fight him.”

“I’m not usually wrong.” He reached up and pressed on his bottom lip with his thumb. “So you said yes then.”

“He’s L. I can’t say no.”

Light looked over at Ryuzaki now and Ryuzaki met his eyes.

“When are we going to have that lunch?” He asked.

“Why not today?” Ryuzaki said.


	11. Chapter 11

One thing that was on Ryuzaki’s mind that he couldn’t shake was the fact that Mr Wammy was  _ in _ Tokyo, but that he couldn’t meet him. There was little reason to think anyone would be watching Ryuzaki, but just in case they were, it would be stupid to risk his cover and for nothing at all except to see Mr Wammy.

Ryuzaki didn’t know what he’d do if he were to meet him. He had nothing to say. Mr Wammy didn’t, either. Part of Ryuzaki wanted to share with him the things that had happened to him during his undercover experience. Light, the club, Misa-Misa. But he didn’t know how to phrase it. What was he supposed to do, just tell him about his day casually? Share his thoughts and feelings? He nearly laughed to think it. They just weren’t… Like that.

Before Ryuzaki had decided to go undercover, he had insisted that Mr Wammy teach him to bake. Mr Wammy had wanted to go over other things, like how to do laundry or how to pay rent, but Ryuzaki wasn’t as interested in those things and hardly listened when Mr Wammy explained them. Finally, once he noticed that Ryuzaki was getting nothing out of it, he exhaustedly showed him to the kitchen and they got down to business.

Ryuzaki nearly quit after his first cake, which was not up to snuff. He hated to fail. He wasn’t used to it. He only did things he was good at, after all. And Mr Wammy had just let him flounder in there! He could just buy cakes at the store if he had to, this was a waste of time. (Anything Ryuzaki didn’t like or wasn’t good at was relegated to Waste of Time.) However, Mr Wammy pressed and Ryuzaki tried again. This time, Mr Wammy gave him some pointers. He showed him how to correct his previous mistakes, how to mix all the ingredients together, how to check whether or not it was perfectly baked. He gave him a few Wammy Family Baking Secrets as well, like which ingredients were interchangeable and how a little extra vanilla added a refined sweetness to all sorts of baked goods. He explained this to Ryuzaki as he taught him to use a hand mixer, bent over him with his hand on the machine, trying to make sure Ryuzaki didn’t explode flour everywhere.  Ryuzaki got the distinct impression at this point of time, like he had for years, that Mr Wammy should have just formally adopted him.

The relationship between Ryuzaki and Mr Wammy was interesting to say the least. They were unorthodox. They had come close to a father-son relationship a few times and always seemed to hover right in the spot where it was and it wasn’t. After all, Mr Wammy was practically an all-purpose butler to Ryuzaki at times and that wasn’t a particularly healthy or ordinary fatherly role to take on. 

If he’d wanted to be his dad, he would have adopted him. But he didn’t. 

To Ryuzaki, that said a lot. For years and years, he waited for the day that Mr Wammy would come to him and sit him down and Ryuzaki imagined that he would say something like, ‘son, I’ve signed all the papers and all that’s left is for you to say yes’ and Ryuzaki would say yes and Mr Wammy would put a hand on his shoulder or hug him or you know, whatever it was that fathers did, and then, he’d have a dad. But Mr Wammy never did this and he rarely if ever touched Ryuzaki and this silence was, well, deafening.

Instead, they walked the line between devastatingly distant family and strangely close business associates.

It wasn’t that Mr Wammy didn’t love Ryuzaki. Ryuzaki thought that he did. After all, he could have hired someone else to play butler and chauffeur and cook and all the other roles he played. If he didn’t love Ryuzaki, he wouldn’t spend so much time with him and Ryuzaki knew he was proud of him. That there was a part of Mr Wammy that loved showing him off to people and bringing in his Skype calls to various parts of the world, introducing him as the world’s greatest detective. He cared about Ryuzaki. But just… Just not enough. Or just not as a father.

He was averse to parenthood, Ryuzaki thought. The concept scared him. To formally adopt Ryuzaki meant that he would formally be a father and that he’d have to take responsibility for Ryuzaki. He’d have to correct him when he needed correction, which he never ever did, and sit down and have Fatherly Talks with him, which he also never did, and commit to always being there for him, which he’d never exactly done out loud. He’d have to give Ryuzaki his family name to pass on. When people wondered what was wrong with Ryuzaki, which he knew they wondered frequently, the first place they’d turn to to voice their concerns would be Mr Wammy. It was a mountain load of responsibility. It wasn’t all fun and games and baking cakes with Family Secrets in the kitchen. Being a dad was hard. And Ryuzaki thought that Mr Wammy just didn’t want the hard parts.

When Ryuzaki was a kid, he wondered if it was because he was queer that Mr Wammy didn’t want him. He didn’t come out as aroace until he was seventeen and not as trans until twenty, but he’d still always  _ been _ both of those things regardless and it made him different. Well, even more different that he would have been in the first place. It made him more unusual and unexplainable. He refused to care for his appearance, which he’d come to realize in later years that it was because he’d always hated it to begin with, so why bother, and he refused to entertain any notion of meeting people and dating, despite Mr Wammy’s insistence once or twice that he ‘meet some boys and make some friends’. Every dress Mr Wammy bought him, he would try on once and then throw out. Every time Mr Wammy bribed another boy at the orphanage to ask Ryuzaki out, Ryuzaki would refuse vehemently, insisting that he barely saw these people as  _ friends _ , much less as romantic interests. For years, Mr Wammy was baffled, even concerned. Of course he’d been supportive once Ryuzaki formally came out to him, but it didn’t stop him from wondering as a kid if those sometimes confusing aspects of his personality didn’t overwhelm Mr Wammy or make Ryuzaki appear undesirable.

He didn’t wonder this too frequently, however. It dredged up a very old and very much unhealed ache in his heart and he hated to feel pain. 

So he did not call Mr Wammy to meet up while he was in Tokyo.

Instead, he committed a light, every day felony and broke into Light’s mailbox.

He had a package. Ryuzaki opened it and then carefully sealed it back up again, like he did with all of Light’s mail, mostly just to pass the time and have a laugh and, of course, to see if Light ever noticed. So far, he had not.

The package was from Misa-Misa. She’d included a few pieces of the merchandise she was selling during this tour and a small, friendly letter to Light. She talked about how excited she was to begin this new tour and how much she’d miss every one of them and how she hoped he and his neighbor were doing well. This came as something to a surprise to Ryuzaki. It must be a reference to him.

At the end of the letter, Misa said that she’d added an extra t-shirt because one of them was for Ryuzaki, so if Light would give that to him, please. And keep him on as a friend, Light, you two are so much alike!

Ryuzaki awkwardly crammed everything back into the box, sealed it all back up, and put it back in Light’s mailbox.

When Ryuzaki returned to his apartment, he was stunned-absolutely stunned-to find that the rug that had been nailed into the floor in his living room had been taken up and was now gone.

He stood in the doorway for a few seconds, unable to believe what he was seeing.

The rug was _ gone _ . The couches and tables were still there as if nothing had happened-the tower of sugar cubes he’d left there still stood-but the rug was gone and all that was left behind was unfinished wood, bent nails, and dry glue.

He stepped inside and stared and then Light came up from behind him.

“Wow, Ryuzaki,” he said and Ryuzaki’s blood boiled. “Did the manager approve this?”

Alright, Ryuzaki thought. This is impressive, Yagami. You’re funny. 

He’d only been gone in the time it took him to walk a block, bust into Light’s mailbox, open his things, and then meticulously seal them shut again. What was that, fifteen minutes, twenty at the absolute most?

And now what was he supposed to do? Wear shoes and socks? In his own home??

“Actually, no,” Ryuzaki said and he didn’t turn around yet. He took a step further into the house. “But they won’t mind. I’m putting in a better rug, you know. The one I had was old.”

“Seems like an ambitious project,” Light said. Ryuzaki turned around finally. Light had followed him inside.

“It is,” Ryuzaki said.

Light was smiling just a little. Ryuzaki admired his restraint. He didn’t look sweaty, necessarily, but his hair was a little less perfect than usual and his face was a little flushed. Moving couches and tearing up rugs will do that to even the most meticulous facade.

“Where did you want to get lunch?” Light asked. His smile was growing more smug by the second.

“Actually, I don’t think I can,” Ryuzaki said out of pure spite. If he had a middle name, it would be pettiness. He did not, however, have a middle name. He barely had a first. “I wasn’t thinking, but I started this project on a whim and now I have to finish before the managers see. Besides-” He lifted up one foot just a little, showing off his sandal. “I hate to wear shoes in the house.” Take that, Light.

Light’s smile faltered for just a second.

“Oh,” he said.

“But if you happen to know anything about installing and removing rugs, which I get the impression that you do, you ought to come with me to the store to pick out the replacement.”

“Oh, actually-”

“No, I insist.”

“I don’t know about rugs.”

“Come.”

So this is what led them to the hardware store, debating the qualities of various rugs. Ryuzaki had never experienced anything so mind numbingly mundane and that was, frankly, a Waste of Time, be transformed so quickly into something fascinating. Light didn’t actually have a much of value to say, but he kept talking, going on and on about how this one is soft, but the color on this one is nice, but this one is thicker. It occurred to Ryuzaki that he just liked to be there to talk with him. Which was ridiculous. But maybe it was a little true.

Making friends was the real Waste of Time. This was highly unusual.

“I nearly forgot,” Light said as Ryuzaki ran his hand over one patch of rug at a stand of displays, comparing two nearly identical patches. “My parents wanted to invite you to family dinner.”

Ryuzaki didn’t know how to respond to this. He made a face.

“It’s on Sunday,” Light pressed, waiting for an answer. “At five.”

“Family Dinner,” Ryuzaki said.

“Yes,” Light said. Cue polite laugh, according to the secret and nearly unreadable script of Light Yagami. “What, doesn’t sound like fun?”

Ryuzaki had never had a Family Dinner. He’d never had a Family. He didn’t think this in order to pity himself, he just thought it. It was a fact, after all. Family Dinner was a new experience.

“It sounds like fun,” Ryuzaki said. “Why do your parents want me there?”

“Well,” Light said. He took another step alongside the display and picked up another patch and passed it to Ryuzaki. “You’re my friend. They want to meet you.”

“Do they meet all of your friends?” Ryuzaki asked and he took the patch. It was 37% less soft than the previous one. No. 30%. He set it down.

Light paused just a microsecond before replying.

“Yes,” he said and he handed Ryuzaki another patch. So that meant no.

“Do you bring them all over to dinner?”

“Ryuzaki, it’s not a big deal,” Light said. “I promise. If you don’t want to go, I can tell them you’re busy. It’s just a friendly gesture. There’s no…” He waved a one hand in the air, the other holding a patch of deep blue rug. “No deeper meaning.”

Ryuzaki snatched the blue patch away from him, pinched between two fingers.

“This is quite soft,” he said.

“I thought so, too,” Light replied. “And the dark blue might look nice.”

“I’ll go,” Ryuzaki said before Light continued. “To dinner. If you tell me whether or not all your friends go to dinner.”

“Does my answer affect whether or not you go?” Light asked and he turned and looked at him. Ryuzaki rubbed the patch with his free hand thoughtlessly.

“No,” he said. “I’m going. Just answer.” Light let out a carefully meted breath.

“Not all my friends go to dinner,” he admitted. “I’ve never brought anyone over before. Believe it or not, but besides the guys you met from work, I don’t know that many people.”

“I believe it.”

“I don’t seem friendly to you?”

“You don’t seem…” Ryuzaki thought the word would have been easier to find. He paused and chewed on his lip a little. A few people scooted past them, admiring the display.

Light put a hand on his hip.

“What?” He said.

“Nothing.”

“Tell me.”

“You don’t seem like you choose friends that easily, that’s all. You pick and choose carefully.”

Light studied his face.

“Are you flattering yourself?” He said. Ryuzaki smirked.

“Yes,” he said. “You should know that by now.”

“But you’ll come?”

“I’ll come,” Ryuzaki said and then he pushed past Light, holding up the blue piece. “Let’s buy this one.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I sketched out some of this little rug exchange in comic form!! you can find it here! -> https://misas-biggest-fan.tumblr.com/post/183008696131/rugs-swatches-a-quick-comic-from-my-fic-an  
> while i'm at it, these other two comics are also kind of relevant, aren't they -> https://misas-biggest-fan.tumblr.com/post/184683033801/how-do-you-think-the-task-force-would-react AND https://misas-biggest-fan.tumblr.com/post/182290376141/theamazingpeterparkerr-mentioned-this-arrested


	12. Chapter 12

Light thought a lot about the way Ryuzaki had laughed in the club the other night. Light had never seen him look like that. Ryuzaki was always stoic, bored, monotone. His mouth was always a straight line or a dissatisfied frown and if he was smiling, it was more of a knowing smirk as he waited for Light to fall into whatever hole he'd dug for him. Ryuzaki had just never looked like that before, so happy and carefree. It had struck Light because Ryuzaki was nearly another person in that moment. There was something that had been wound up tight in him then that he’d set free. 

And it made Light think about the things that he had all wound up inside  _ him _ . He felt like he was constantly censoring himself. He knew he maybe had a few more secrets than the average person because of some of his ‘hobbies’ on the side, but he knew everyone else lived like this as well. It was just how the world worked. But how could they stand it, being one person on the inside and one person on the outside? How could they stand spending all day acting? Was he weak, is that why he was slowly becoming so exhausted? Why he felt so imprisoned inside himself? 

He got the feeling sometimes that Ryuzaki wasn't this way. Ryuzaki seemed… Was genuine the right word? He was just so unusual. It was as though he never censored anything. If he did, he wouldn't act the way he did, right? If he was going to put on a front, like Light did, wouldn't he be just like Light?

If Light stopped censoring, would he be just like Ryuzaki? Light didnt know. He couldn't even picture himself sitting or speaking like Ryuzaki. But he couldn't picture really… anything. If he were to stop censoring, who would he be? If he let go of the coiled tension inside him, how would it spring? He tried to picture it and all he could think about was the pent up violence inside him. If he were to let go, Light thought he might put his fist through a wall. He might run his car into a building. He didn't know what else  _ to _ do. He didn't know who  _ he _ was deep inside himself. There came a point where you censored so much, you don't hardly remember what you're censoring, but Light knew that it hurt. He didn't know who he was hiding inside him.

Something about Ryuzaki’s shamelessness unsettled Light. (That was a good word. Shameless. ‘Genuine’ wasn’t  _ wrong _ perse, but it didn’t capture Ryuzaki like ‘shameless’ did.) Everyone else in the world lied for appearances, so why didn’t he? Why didn’t Ryuzaki have to suffer like the rest of them?? It was disturbing and fascinating and… thrilling. Light felt conflictingly about it. He resented Ryuzaki for the way he lived like no one was watching, as if Light felt that they both owed the world some crucial and painful piece of them and Ryuzaki wasn’t paying up like Light was. What made him so special?? But at the same time, Light respected him for it. Ryuzaki had thrown off some sort of heavy mantle. He didn’t care whether or not his hair was messy or whether or not people talked about him badly or whether they thought he was bad or ridiculous or whether he looked respectable, presentable, whether or not he was hiding the realness inside him adequately enough. There was something intoxicatingly freeing about that concept. Ryuzaki probably knew everything that was inside him, whereas the inside of Light seemed sometimes like a gaping sort of chasm. An empty hole where he felt something should be.

He thought a lot as well about the reaction of his coworkers at the dinner table to Ryuzaki and how he’d had to deflect their attention. How dare they stare and talk? Ryuzaki had the guts to be shameless, not them. And besides, he was like Light. He was genius, exciting, multifaceted, and he and Light were the same. If anyone was going to mock Ryuzaki, they’d have to go through Light first. Light realized that he respected Ryuzaki more than anyone else except maybe his own father.

This was all part of the reason why it took Light so long to realize he was queer. Not that nineteen is that long or late to realize, just that Light spent nineteen full years denying it vehemently. Not only was being queer unacceptable within the character he’d created for himself to live as, but he just assumed everyone felt like him. That everyone else felt so damn disconnected from the idea of being a girl, that romance was all a part of the elaborate social theatrics that everyone put on nonstop. That it was all preformative, all something you did because it was expected, not because it came from you organically. Nothing at all came from Light organically. (Except maybe the game he played with Ryuzaki and the crimes he orchestrated. It was under the table, so it could be real. That’s part of what made it all so tantalizing. All that came from Light organically was violent and angry and tasted red-hot, like pain he didn’t know he had from a self he didn’t know he was hiding.)

So Light had been forced to go searching inside that chasm inside him to find some semblance of self and he found that he was queer and this terrified him deeply. Not only did this mean that there was some level on which other people  _ weren’t _ lying when he’d thought that they were, that everyone was, but that there was an intrinsic and unchangeable part of him that didn’t fit into the plans he’d prepared for himself and the plans that the world had for him. Light liked to fit into the plans the world had. He liked to be respected and taken seriously and he liked to the best always and this might break the mold a little too much. After all, the world wasn’t kind and the mold wasn’t flexible, and especially not for people like him. But if he wasn’t the best, what was it all for, anyway?! 

Light did not often search this chasm inside him. It felt big and dark and empty to him and it wasn’t so simple as to actually enter a real, physical cave. Finding yourself was not an easy or tangible task to take on. He didn’t know where to start if he wanted to. Besides, all that he’d found so far had been a little painful, had tasted like blood in his mouth.

So when he discovered that he was aromantic  _ and _ asexual  _ and _ trans, he’d been a little shaken up. He’d shut himself up in his room and tried desperately to deal with this in a way that no one else would notice a difference in him and he tasted the blood between his teeth that had bubbled up from that chasm, that endless canyon deep like a wound in the earth, and refused to let himself feel, even as tears slipped down his cheeks numbly. He began to formulate a plan that would allow him to live his life and get what he wanted despite this… This unforeseen roadblock, and tears gathered unhindered at the end of his chin, his face blank. He shut off the firehose of blood and emotion inside him.

Now, five years later, Light removed the rug from his neighbors living room as fast as he could and this nasty and bizarre little gesture felt so  _ real _ , but it was real in a way that didn’t hurt, at least not as much.

The sugarcubes had been a prideful touch for Light. He’d nearly risked getting caught to fix them up on the coffee table just like Ryuzaki had had them, but it added a little something to the shock of finding your rug mysteriously gone from underneath all your furniture. He’d gone fast, stacking sugarcubes like it was a marathon sport, breathing heavy and hot with sweat from the effort he’d had to make, the gloves he’d worn to avoid fingerprints leaving him a little clumsy. Behind him, Matsuda was telling him to hurry up, the last strips of the carpet in his arms.

Then, he’d ran back into his own apartment, the rug rolled up in strips and discarded all over his bedroom. Matsuda followed, still chatting, until Light thanked him and swore him to secrecy and hurried him along, probably a little rudely. Then, he tried to clean up in the mirror as best as he could, but he couldn’t stop grinning. He’d done a lot of planning for this one, between timing when Ryuzaki broke into his mailbox and how long he took to practicing once taking up and re-laying his own rug just to be absolutely sure. He’d told Matsuda he needed help doing a surprise project for a friend and Matsuda, excited to make more friends, had come along to help move the couch, believing he was doing someone a secret favor.

Light wasn’t unexperienced enough to keep the things he’d stolen from Ryuzaki in his house, but he also wasn’t happy and well-adjusted enough to just throw away these little connections he had to him. So instead, although he took the rug out carefully and piece by piece to throw away at the dump across the street that same night and he’d poured all the sugar bit by bit down his drain, he kept one square of rug and one tiny container of sugar and he kept them in a box buried deep in his closet.

That night, as Light was cutting the rug apart to take to the dump in small pieces, his phone began to ring. The number was encrypted. It was L.

He picked up his phone from off the table slowly and pulled himself to his feet and he hesitated, standing there, paralyzed.

He was nervous. He didn’t know what this guy was like or what he really wanted from him. And L was powerful.

Except, Light was powerful too. L just didn’t know it. And this was ideal, this way Light could continue to lead the case in the wrong direction, just like he had been doing. He braced himself and he answered the phone.

“Hello?”

A computer voice answered him.

“Hello, Light Yagami. I’m impressed with how you’ve committed these crimes-very clever. You impress me. But I  _ will _ catch you.”

Light blanched.

He was quiet for a minute, stunned.

“Hello?” L’s computer voice said.

“L,” Light said and it was hard to pull together the hundreds of thoughts he was having all at once, especially paired with the thoughts his fake self was supposed to be having. Living a lie was a complicated business. “Are you saying you think I’m behind all of this??”

“Yes. Again, I’m impressed.”

“I think you have it wrong,” Light sputtered. “What could possibly make you think I’d do this?”

“I have my reasons. I’m-hmm… I’m 67% sure that it’s you.”

Something about L seemed familiar to Light. His speech pattern, maybe. The too-casual arrogance. The way it sort of sounded like he was eating and talking at the same time.

“67% huh?” Light said. “Well I’m sorry to tell you, but you’re just wrong.”

“I’m not usually wrong.”

Standing there in his living room, his phone pressed to his face, Light got the distinct feeling that he was speaking with Ryuzaki. He thought if he looked up, he’d see Ryuzaki standing there in front of him, his eyes unblinking and his bored expression masking a scheming smirk, pushing on his lip with his thumb. Emotion boiled inside Light. If Ryuzaki was here, Light would punch his nose in.

“Ryuzaki-” Light started exasperatedly and then the words strangled in his throat as he realized what he’d said.

“Excuse me?” Said L.

“Oh, sorry,” Light said. “I just, ahem. What were you saying?”

“No, what were  _ you _ saying?”

“I just-” Light ground his teeth. “I was thinking about this… Guy I know. I didn’t mean to say that.”

“Interesting,” L said. “Anyway, 74% now.”

“What??” Light exclaimed.

“I’d like for us to work together over video chats and phone calls, primarily. Of course,  _ I _ won’t be on video-just you.”

“Hold on, hold on.” Light said. “You just accused me of robbery  _ and _ murder. But you want me to work with you on this?” He began to pace angrily across the room, kicking aside pieces of rug.

“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer, Mr Yagami.”

“I’m not your enemy, L.”

“So we’re friends?”

Light was seconds away from throwing his phone through the front window. What was going  _ on _ ?! What was wrong with this guy?

And maybe it didn’t make a ton of sense, but the longer L talked, the more Light wanted to go next door and drag Ryuzaki out of his house and beat him senseless.

Light pulled himself together.

“Friends don’t typically accuse each other of murder,” he hissed, his voice on the edge of control. 

“Then prove me wrong, Mr Yagami. Can I call you Light?”

“I thought you said you were in the area? How come I can’t just meet you?”

“Who’s to say you wouldn’t organize my death if I were to meet you?”

“Your suspicions are completely unfounded. You don’t even know me!”

“That may be true. But I hope to get to know you. And I’m compiling a profile of the culprit.”

“If you think I fit that profile, I think you’ll be surprised at how far off you are.”

“Then tell me what someone like them must be like.”

This was just getting ridiculous. He sounded exactly like… Ugh! But Ryuzaki wasn’t L, of course not. 

But they sure had a lot in common already.

Ryuzaki wasn’t L. Right?

“Well,” Light started, wrestling his anger internally. He forced himself to stop pacing and to sit on the end of his bed, his free hand cross over his chest. “The team and I decided that were probably someone with a lot of power to begin with, a lot of pull. Someone well-prepared, probably very educated.”

“I think you’re wrong.”

“Then what do you think,” Light asked through gritted teeth.

“They’re someone with relatively little power, but just enough to have a taste, enough pull to want more. This is a power grab, essentially.”

Hold on, a  _ power grab _ ?? Light was doing good things! He was making the world a better place! If power came with that well, he wasn’t one to say no, but that was a long-term goal. This was not a power grab, Light thought.

“They’re also someone arrogant. They don’t necessarily have to be over-educated, but they’re clever for sure and they know it. This is nearly a game to them. That’s why they chose Tokyo for the latest hit-because they live here and they’re teasing the police. They want to bring it closer to home, see if anyone notices. They want credit and they want a good chase.”

“What makes you think they live here?”

“Well, you  _ are  _ living here. It’s just a fact.”

Light took a deep breath and rubbed his temple.

“I’m not doing this,” he insisted.

“That’s exactly what someone who was guilty would say.”

“That’s also exactly what someone who  _ wasn’t _ guilty would say.”

“I believe the latest hit was Anatoly Vanin from Russia, right?”

“How would I know.”

“Have you planned the next one?”

“I’m not planning any of them!” 

Light wondered how long L would keep pressing this. He kicked a piece of rug across the room from where he sat.

If L really suspected him, he’d focus a lot of energy into catching him. He’d do probably anything. He’d bug his apartment. He’d have him followed. He’d trace his phone calls. Most of Light wanted to kick a hole in the wall, but part of him was almost excited. This had been too easy so far. Maybe L was right a little bit. Light wanted a good chase. At least part of him did.

“I know this is a slow game,” L said. “And I’m ready to wait it out. But I just cannot wait to see your next move.”


	13. Chapter 13

Light was a person with a plan, always, and he was never surprised or unprepared. This is why he came out to his parents all at once during a car ride and he had a rock solid, bulletproof plan and this plan was the only thing that gave him any comfort whatsoever.

He was nineteen at the time. He was going to the grocery store with both his parents to pick up some extra ingredients they needed for Sunday Dinner and he sat in the backseat and wiped his sweaty palms off on his pants and launched into a delicately prepared speech. He knew his parents were kind and loving and open-minded and that they’d never reject him and he was incredibly grateful for that, but it was still difficult to say these things out loud. It was still difficult to know that his life would change, that people would look at him differently. After all, there’s almost no situation in which coming out is actually easy.

Except that he had this all planned, of course. A plan for coming out and for doing damage control and for reworking his life so that he could still manipulate the whole world into giving him what he wanted despite everything. But his nerves were still a little wracked. And besides, he could  _ predict _ , but he couldn’t control his parent’s reactions. There were still a few factors in their reactions that he knew he couldn’t prepare for. So instead of panicking, he shut off his emotions the best he could (which, to be fair, was pretty completely) and reminded himself of his plan and then he gave his speech.

“I’m asexual,” he said. His mother was turned around in her seat to see him and his father looked at him from the rearview mirror. “And aromantic, so I don’t get romantic crushes on anyone. And I’m trans. I know this can be a lot to take in-” His voice was shaking just enough for only him to notice. Not a necessarily unexpected variable, but certainly an undesirable one. He sucked in a breath. “I just wanted to let you both know. I’m not attracted to anyone and I’d like to be called he.”

There was a stunned silence for a moment.

“Oh, Light,” Light’s mother finally said and she reached over and put a hand on his knee comfortingly. “Of course, sweetheart. You know we support you no matter what.”

“I know,” Light said. His emotions were strangled to death inside the giant hole inside him. It was very convenient.

“Your mother and I are here for you, Light,” his father said. “I can’t say I’m not a little surprised, but you know we support you, right?”

“I know,” Light said again. “Thank you.” Then, because this had taken a level of vulnerability out of him that he was not used to giving, he quickly said, “Are we close to the store? I just remembered Sayu asked us to bring home ice cream as well.”

He spent the rest of the grocery store trip trailing his parents around and trying to stop himself from pulling his hair out. He watched their every move for signs of discomfort or disappointment or awkwardness, but they did their best to act normal. He’d decided very purposefully to tell them on the way there so that they’d have the entirety of the trip to ask him questions and get the awkwardness out of their systems, but that didn’t mean it’d be an easy shopping trip. They were quiet for a while and Light let them process until the spices aisle in which his mother said, “how long did you know, dear?”

“Well,” Light said patiently. “Forever.” It was easier this way than to explain to them the lengthy and painful questioning process, the ways he’d shakily misidentified for months, the despair and confusion it had caused him in his youth, the way he sometimes  _ still _ doubted himself and worried that he’d been wrong or lying to himself or confused. Better to show them a confident and self-assured front that matched the narrative that they’d heard about queer people than to give them room to question him or become confused themselves.

“Oh,” his mother said, but not the way someone says ‘oh’ like they’ve just added interesting new information to what they’d had before, but the way someone says ‘oh’ when they’re wringing their hands and on the verge of tears. Then, his mother reached over and pulled him in for a hug right in front of everyone and Light stiffly and awkwardly hugged her back. His family was not overly affectionate or ‘touchy’ and Light wasn’t used to being held like this, and so desperately, and in public! When she pulled away, she was wiping off her face.

“Mom,” Light said awkwardly. “It’s okay. Really.”

“I just want you to be happy,” she said and she sniffled. “We want you to feel loved.”

“I do!” Light said. “Really!”

“Sachiko,” Light’s dad said, clearly also a little surprised. “She knows we love her.”

“Him,” Light’s mom answered.

“Oh, yes,” Light’s dad said and his hands grew tighter on the metal handle of the shopping cart. “That’s what I meant. I’m sorry, Light.” 

“It’s alright,” Light said.

By the fruit, Light’s mom asked more questions.

No, he’d never had a crush. No, not even on the boy from second grade, he’d just held his hand because he was a kid and he was confused. No, he didn’t plan on getting married. Yes, he’d always ‘felt like a boy’ and no that wasn’t something he could really explain well.

Light held on and answered all the questions he could. He reminded himself over and over. It’s a transition period. It’s a transition period. And he was doing damage control. His father still hadn’t said much. He’d clammed up and was pouring his attention into picking the best green bell peppers out of a line of up ten identical green bell peppers. Light thought that if he lost the respect of his dad, he didn’t know what he’d do. There was no one in the world he respected more than his dad.

By the time they arrived home, Light’s mom had stopped asking questions and stopped crying. They had their dinner in relative peace and normality. Light had already told Sayu, who was excited that now it wasn’t a secret anymore.

That night, Light’s father knocked on the door to his bedroom and Light called for him to come in and he did.

He had been sitting at his desk, pouring over his college textbooks. His father sat down at the end of his bed.

“I’ve done some reading,” his dad finally said. “And I think I understand.”

“I can always answer your questions if you’d like, Dad,” Light said politely. He reminded himself that he was in control of this situation, although he didn’t quite feel like he was and that made him very angry. He folded up his anger like a piece of paper and filed it away.

His father told him he’d read up on HRT and various surgeries and had read articles by asexuals about their experiences and Light listened to him and with anyone else, he might feel the urge to cut them off or correct their language, but he held back for his dad.

They had a very long talk. His dad said that he and his mother had always thought that maybe Light was gay, but that this made more sense, and that it might take them both some time to understand the idea, but that they supported him no matter what. He’d researched Light’s college GSA and he asked him some more questions about what he wanted and if they ought to start saving to help him with surgeries and what his life would look like if it wasn’t going to look like being a woman and marrying a man and starting a family. Light tried to answer as best and as confidently as he could.

It was a nice talk, but Light still felt just a little out of control and he wanted to go back to his textbook, where he wouldn’t have to keep suffocating the anxiety in his stomach.

After this, Light’s parents went out of their way to be as supportive as they could. They weren’t perfect and often had a lot of strange questions, but they were really, really trying. 

He started T two years later at 21, around the same time he graduated college. As a graduation present, Light’s dad got him a nice watch. It was silver with a wide band, very masculine, and he told Light he was proud to have him as a son and Light felt a well of emotion inside him crack a little and he just said thank you.

 


	14. Chapter 14

Ryuzaki had come out to Mr Wammy about his asexuality and aromanticism when he was seventeen. They didn’t usually have heart to hearts and Ryuzaki wasn’t about to get mushy now. So instead, when Mr Wammy brought him dinner, Ryuzaki mentioned it in passing.

“Have you heard the word asexual?” He asked, his words muffled by food in his mouth and his eyes were glued as usual to his plate.

“Yes,” Mr Wammy said. “I think so.”

Ryuzaki explained the definition of both asexuality and aromanticism anyway, dryly, like he was reading out of a dictionary, two fingers pinched around his fork.

“Alright,” Mr Wammy said uncomfortably.

“I’m just letting you know,” Ryuzaki said. “So you can stop thinking I’ll date anyone.”

“Sounds a little lonely,” Mr Wammy said and Ryuzaki put another forkful of his dinner into his mouth. He hadn’t entirely expected Mr Wammy to make any further comments and he resented this one.

“I’m not lonely,” he said. “I’m busy is what I am.” It was true. Even if he wasn’t aroace, it wasn’t like he had time to be out and about meeting people. There were crimes to be solved, murder mysteries to be unwound, and those were much more fulfilling than anything else would be anyway. He didn’t mourn the life everyone thought he should have had. Not much, at least.

“Well, alright,” Mr Wammy said. “I’m going to go lay down. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Mmphh,” Ryuzaki hummed and turned the page on the file he was reading.

A few days later, there were two small flags on his desk, propped up in a cup holder. They must have been from Mr Wammy. Ryuzaki left them there and at first, he wasn’t  _ too _ thrilled about decorating with pride flags, but they grew on him.

He came out as trans at twenty in a similar way. He and Mr Wammy didn’t really speak again about his aroace-ness, but Mr Wammy had at least stopped trying to set Ryuzaki up. This time, Ryuzaki went to Mr Wammy and asked that he take his measurements because Ryuzaki didn’t exactly know how and wasn’t interested to learn. At this point, he had already begun picking more masculine codenames and cutting his hair shorter in the bathroom on his own and Mr Wammy had actually asked him about it a few times, but he’d refused to answer. Now, he held the measuring tape in his hands and told him that he was going to buy a binder.

“A what?” Mr Wammy said. He was sitting at his computer desk, looking at Ryuzaki from across the room.

Ryuzaki explained.

“I’ll get several,” he said. “To see what I like.”

Mr Wammy had been Ryuzaki’s tailor for most of his life too and he had done all his measurements before and had altered clothes that needed it, so Ryuzaki supposed he could help.

“Well,” Mr Wammy said. “Is it safe?”

“Yes,” Ryuzaki said. This was a little bit of a stretch of the truth.

“L,” Mr Wammy said and he sounded a little exasperated. “I don’t think you’ll like wearing something like that. I think it would be very uncomfortable.”

This was actually a worry that Ryuzaki had entertained. He was extremely particular about the clothes he wore and if something was uncomfortable, he could barely tolerate it. But he had decided it was worth a try because he just kept  _ thinking _ about it. And besides, he’d come to terms now with the fact that he was a man. He knew that men didn’t  _ have _ to be flat-chested and that he could very well continue on with his life exactly as he’d lived it already and be just as much a man as if he’d been cis, but he was curious. What if he liked it? He’d learned that you couldn’t really know some of these things about yourself until you’d experimented a little, so that’s what this was. An experiment.

“There’s a 66% chance I won’t like it,” he admitted. “But it’s difficult to weigh because I don’t yet have all the information. It’s worth trying.”

Mr Wammy nodded stiffly and then, he took down the measurements and promised to make the orders.

“Does this mean you want to be a boy?” Mr Wammy said as he took down the numbers. He was trying to sound casual or sensitive, but he mostly sounded stiff. He often did. Mr Wammy did not like to talk about personal affairs or emotions with Ryuzaki and Ryuzaki didn’t like to talk about them with him, either. It was a tiny bit better now since Ryuzaki had already come out as aroace and Mr Wammy was more used to the idea of him being queer and of him being so obviously not feminine, but he still didn’t seem to know how to approach it.

“Yes,” Ryuzaki said because although the language Mr Wammy had used wasn’t ideal, it was better than explaining the specifics to him. After all, Mr Wammy could do some research online if he was so curious and Ryuzaki thought he probably would. And with that, Ryuzaki left the room and continued what he had been doing before.

Soon after this, a small trans pride flag and pronoun pin, evidence not only of the research Mr Wammy had done but of his silent acceptance, sat on Ryuzaki’s desk and he added them to the cup with the others.

And since then, they hadn’t spoke of it again.


	15. Chapter 15

The next morning, once Light picked up the mail himself, he went next door with Misa’s present in hand and Ryuzaki put on a Grammy Award-winning performance comprised of false surprise. Ryuzaki had paid to have people from the hardware store install his new rug that morning and he was sitting on their porch with his feet up and a coffee, watching them. It was a little disappointing because it meant that Ryuzaki had avoided almost all of the inconvenience that Light had worked so hard to cause him, but oh well. The point had been made.

“I’d make you a coffee,” Ryuzaki said as he hung Misa’s present over the back of his chair. “But I can’t reach the kitchen.”

“That’s alright,” Light said. “You know, I was actually thinking earlier.”

“Oh?”

“Why did you move here?” Light asked and he folded his arms. Ryuzaki didn’t even look up.

“Lots of reasons,” Ryuzaki said and he sipped his coffee and watched the rug being rolled out.

“I’ve got time.” He didn’t. He had to be at work soon, but he wanted to probe around about Ryuzaki’s life. He didn’t _actually_ think Ryuzaki was L. Of course not, that would be ridiculous. (Right? Right??) But thinking about it had made him realize that Ryuzaki kept a little too much mystery around him, especially for someone so honest. It made Light start to wonder if Ryuzaki _was_ hiding something. He’d only been living here for a few months and he’d never mentioned in too much detail where he was before.

“Hmm. Well. I’ve always liked Tokyo. I need to keep my Japanese sharp, after all. And I’m a fourth Japanese myself, you know. It’s important to understand your heritage.”

“Heritage, huh?”

“Sure.”

“You never told me much about where you were before now.”

“I told you. I travel a lot.”

“Tell me more?”

Ryuzaki frowned and he finally looked up at Light.

“I could,” he said. “If you tell me why you want to know so bad.”

Light laughed and then shrugged casually.

“Just trying to get to know you. Is that not allowed?”

“Not usually. I’ll tell you, though. Once we finally go to lunch. But don’t you have work in ten minutes?”

“We’ve been putting off lunch.”

“Have we?”

“Yes.”

“Then we won’t anymore. Once you’re free on Saturday, we’ll go.”

“You have to promise or I won’t believe you,” Light said.

“Promises mean absolutely nothing, but I’ll promise you. I’ll go. I’ll tell you my whole life story over lunch if you want.”

Light stuck out his hand.

“Shake on it,” he said. Ryuzaki laughed a little sardonically and took his hand.

“Alright,” he said and then, Light went to work.

His conversation with L was still bouncing around in his head. He was incensed. L had the upper hand on him in nearly every way right now and he _needed_ to even out the playing field. He had to find L or get information on him or concoct some way to prove his innocence. It was time for a big move.

But then again, isn’t that exactly what L would expect? What all did L know about him? If he was too obvious in casting the blame elsewhere, L would see through it easy. It was a delicate situation and Light had been walked into something of a corner. Every single one of his movements would be scrutinized now. Everything would become suspicious. He’d been getting ready to plan his next hit, but now he had to make sure that he had alibis, that he didn’t even lift his cover in his own home. He had to figure out what sort of dirt L had on him to pin the crimes to him so fast.

Work was boring. Everyone had moved on to different cases now, small-time stuff like muggings and traffic violations and other things that bored Light to tears. He spent most of his time doing paperwork and daydreaming about who to have killed next.

Halfway through the day, Matsuda and Aizawa were arguing their way through another dead-end conversation and Light usually blocked them out until he heard them mention L again.

“What do you think L is like?” Matsuda was saying. Light was reminded of the last time he heard Matsuda talking about L, and then _this_ whole fiasco had happened.

“I dunno,” Aizawa replied.

“He’s probably some stuffy old dude,” Matsuda said.

It had become common knowledge now that Light was the only person told to stay on with L. He could feel Aizawa and Matsuda looking at him from the other side of the desk and he finally looked up.

“I can’t tell you anything,” he said to them.

“Is it classified?” Matsuda asked.

“It’s just that I don’t know much about him, either,” Light said. “He only wants to communicate over phone calls.”

The rest of the office had gone a little quieter. People were listening.

“What did he say?”

“He said-” Light wasn’t about to tell everyone that _he_ was L’s prime suspect. What else could he say? “Well, I don’t know, we just talked about the case. He told me his theories.”

“What are his theories?”

“ _That’s_ probably classified.”

“Was he rude?” Aizawa asked. “He seems rude.”

“He’s rude,” Light said dryly.

All eyes were on him now and he looked around uncomfortably. Light stood up and walked quickly to the water fountain by his desk and grabbed up a foam cup in an effort to make this seem more normal, maybe shake off some of the eyes. If anything, it only made it worse.

“I don’t have anything interesting to say about him,” he said.

“Why won’t he meet you face to face?” Someone asked.

“He’s, I dunno, paranoid.”

“Can you call him right now?”

“No.”

“Who does he think did it all?”

“He didn’t say.”

Light filled up his water cup and looked back out at the office. Every head was turned to him, waiting with bated breath. Light nearly rolled his eyes. Instead, he took a sip of his water.

Matsuda finally broke the silence.

“Well…?” He said. “Tell us… _Something.”_

Light glanced over the room again to meet waiting eyes.

If he refused, he wasn’t sure the office would just forget about it. In fact, if he made a big deal out of saying no now, it might become a Thing. He’d be bugged about it until the end of time, his coworkers forever wondering exactly what it was that was so secret about his conversations with L. However, if he told them some sort of story now, it might ignite their interest, but it was interest that would eventually die with the mystery intrigue out of the picture.

Light took another thoughtful sip of his water and swirled it in his hand gently like he was holding some sort of champagne glass. He turned back to the water cooler and filled it up again.

“Light,” Matsuda said.

This was good. Extend the suspense. If he got them really into it now, they’d talk about it for a good week and then let it die. The more he hammed this up, the more information, false or not, that he gave them, the less he figured he’d have to deal with it in the long run.

And what exactly _could_ he say? What would L expect Fake Light to keep secret and what would be to Real Light’s benefit to keep secret and where was the overlap? He couldn’t tell them L suspected him. So if he just didn’t mention the suspect, he’d probably be alright, right? He could make things up if need be.

Light turned back around, his water cup in hand, and he took a step forward.

“He called me last night on my cell phone,” Light said. “His number’s secret and he keeps using that voice scrambler. I think he likes cases. I almost think he likes _murder_. He thinks its a game.”

“A game??” Someone said and Light took another step. He was back at his own desk now, but he kept pacing, walking past it. He took another careful sip of his water.

“Yes,” Light said. “He said he was going to wait this guy out a little. I think he wants to wait and see if he screws up. He doesn’t care about preventing more deaths, he just wants to win.”

“What makes you say that?” Aizawa said.

“Just the way he talked about it,” Light said. “It’s hard to tell with the computer voice, but it almost sounded like he was smiling or even laughing a little when he talked about it. He likes to be right, you know, _has_ to be right. He has a different profile for the robber and he rubbed it in my face.”

That was close, Light thought. I have to be careful what I say, don’t mention who he suspects.

“He sounds sort of… Villainous,” Matsuda breathed, sucked into the story.

“He’s mean,” Light said.

“How did he put together who did it?” Someone else asked. “What information does he have?”

“He says he knows about where they live.”

“How??” Said Mogi from the back of the room.

How indeed. L had declined to share.

That must mean it was important, how he’d gotten that info. It was something he didn’t want Light to know. He didn’t want Light to realize where he’d slipped up.

“He didn’t say,” Light said. “He very much likes to be in charge. And he’s an asshole. But…” Light swirled his foam cup again and took a drink. “Either the robber made a dumb mistake, which they probably didn’t, knowing how good they’ve been up until now. Or… Someone must have snitched.” Light’s fingers tightened around the cup. “Someone they work with, who helps them with their crimes, is a mole.”

“Woah,” said Matsuda quietly.

Light began to pace faster. Inside the cavern inside him, blood boiled up in delicately contained rage.

“But it seems like L only knows the general area they live. Who ever is a spy for L is someone who only knows that much. But this guy would be an idiot to let all his subordinates know where he lives. Therefore, it’s someone not very high up in his chain of command, someone who tailed him… Or… Traced one of his calls. A hacker expert of some sort. That’s who told L.

“But he still has a specific suspect in mind, someone from that area. Why that one person if he only knows a general location? He has to know this person personally, that’s the only explanation. He’s met them, profiled them, and something… Something about them was suspicious enough to him to begin to think it was them. So we know he knows his suspect personally.”

 _Ryuzaki_ knew Light personally. Could it really be?? Ryuzaki had seen Light, had caught him committing a crime the first time they’d met. He knew Light was clever and that he could lie. That he fit L’s profile.

L had to be someone he knew, but if it wasn’t Ryuzaki, then who?? Who else had entered his life mysteriously at exactly the right time? Who else was so clever and so interested in Light? Who else _sounded_ _exactly like L_?

Light’s plans were steel traps. He left no trace. His alibis were foolproof. He used nothing attached to his name. No one overhead the phone calls he made. Either Mikami or Takada, Light’s right hand people, really did snitch, or Ryuzaki was L.

And it wasn’t Mikami and Takada.

Shit. Shit shit shit shit.

“He knows them personally??” Matsuda was exclaiming. “That’s crazy! I wonder if they’re actually friends!”

Light’s hand tightened around the foam cup until one side started to crack and water leaked out onto his fingers.

He wished he hadn’t had to come to this conclusion while every single person in the office had their eyes glued to him. He looked down and let out a breath and smiled a little.

“Wouldn’t that be something,” he responded passively to Matsuda’s comment, but inside, the boiling, raging blood was spilling up over the crack in the ground of his heart. In his mind, he tore his own hair out. He threw this cup against the wall. He flipped desks over and busted chairs into walls.

Shit!!

“When is he going to call you next?” Aizawa asked.

“I don’t know,” Light said and he looked up now and forced a casual smile. He started to pace again and he raised his half-split water cup just a little, gesturing to the room, and then he tossed back just enough of it so that the leak would stop wetting his fingertips. He thought of that crack in the ground of his heart, leaking bubbling blood, wetting his fingers, splitting his heart open like a dry desert floor. “I’ll let you all know if he ever comes up with anything interesting.”

Light’s mind was reeling. Ryuzaki was L. Oh, he could just _kill_ him!! Maybe he’d poison his damn coffee one morning. Maybe he’d push him off that stupid railing he always leaned on in the mornings. Maybe he’d hit him with his car. Maybe he’d strangle him to death with his bare hands.

So what did Ryuzaki expect from Light now? Did he know that Light knew? Was he suspicious? Had he meant to leave a trail back to himself? Light thought no, that this was unintentional. Light finally had something on him. Now he just had to figure out what to do with that.

Light walked to the trash can and he threw away the foam cup. Goodbye crack and leak. He looked down at it in the basket and thought about hot blood coming up from between the split in the foam.

“Do you think he’ll catch the guy?” Mogi spoke up from the back of the room again. “The guy who’s doing it all?”

Light looked up from the trash can and before he answered, everything came together in his head like puzzle pieces falling into place.

This was it. He’d figured it out. He knew how to get the upper hand on L.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you and me both are here for one thing and one thing only-to see two of the world's dumbest detectives become best friends and learn how to love each other. and that is exactly what i'm going to deliver. so if the murder plot gets a little spotty, know that i'm trying my best, but im also a dumbass!!!!
> 
> ALSO thank you all again for reading this !! Don't forget to subscribe to me and the story and bookmark so you can get hit up every time I post (which isn't frequent enough to be obnoxious, I promise). I also love and appreciate every single person who comments, even if you just say something like 'kudos' or '2 thumbs up' or 'you think youre funny but are you?????? are you rly?????? like are you rly????' Also also, if you haven't yet, check out my BB and Naomi story, which takes place at arooooound the same time this story does and it's equally fun, so click the link right below this note to go to the next story in the series and read it! AND join me on tumblr at misas-biggest-fan.tumblr.com  
> thanks again!


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you're here bc of my tip on 'a means' and you haven't read 'an exercise', ill catch you up. L is undercover and living next door to Light in your everyday apartment complex. he frequently makes him coffee. L also met Near (who I write w they/them pronouns bc im in charge in this joint) just once a week or so earlier in order to mentor them through solving a case. 'an exercise' takes place a few months pre-LABB  
> If you are here bc you got an email that i posted a new chapter and you read 'an exercise' but not 'a means', you might like to know that A (another they/them. none of you can stop me. i'm out of control) has made a few flashback-style appearances in 'a means' and the thought of them is a source of constant pain for Beyond, who made the terrible mistake of using his eyes to tell A that they're going to die very young.  
> if you're here bc you read both stories, then thank you, i love you, and i Will die for you. this chapter might throw a wrench in some preconceived notions.

When Ryuzaki opened the door the next morning to watch the sunrise and bring Light a cup of coffee, he found Near, the kid from Wammy’s, slumped against his front door on his welcome mat, dead asleep.

He stared down at them, a hot tumbler in each hand, and was at a loss.

Finally, he nudged Near awkwardly with his foot.

Near bolted up with a start but they were silent.

“Near,” Ryuzaki said.

Near looked up now at Ryuzaki and they looked stunned and confused, as though Ryuzaki had woken up them up from deep sleep and they still hadn’t quite remembered where they were. They looked bleary and exhausted, their bleach blonde curls a thick mess of tangles.

“Good morning,” Ryuzaki said.

Near pulled themself to their feet, wobbling and holding onto the wall. They had on a pair of filthy sneakers, some dingy looking pajamas, and a worn, black leather jacket. Their eyes were red and swollen with exhaustion.

“Mr Ryuzaki,” they said a little confusedly. “I need to talk to you.”

At this same time, Light opened his front door and stepped out and turned to see Near.

“Oh!” He said. 

“Good morning, Light,” Ryuzaki said and he leaned over Near’s head and handed him his tumbler. Light took it and his eyes went from Ryuzaki to Near and back again. “I have a visitor,” Ryuzaki said as if to explain, although it really explained nothing.

“I can see,” Light said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you,” Near said.

“This is my cousin,” Ryuzaki said without missing a beat. “Near.”

“Near??”

“Near.”

“Well, I’m Light,” Light said and he smiled politely at Near. “How long will you be here?”

“A week,” Ryuzaki answered for them. “Just a short visit.”

“He looks exhausted.”

“They. And yes, they are. It was a long trip from England, right Near?” Ryuzaki said.

Near just nodded.

“But they know I’m very, very busy here,” Ryuzaki continued. “And I’m sure my father, Mr Watari, can’t wait to have them back home, right Near?”

“Right,” Near said.

Light made a face at Ryuzaki, confused. Ryuzaki stared back blankly.

“Enjoy your day at work, Light,” Ryuzaki said. “Say hello to L for me.”

Once Light was gone, Ryuzaki dragged Near inside and shut the door behind them hard.

Ryuzaki didn’t ask yet. Instead, he sat down on the couch and rubbed his temples and then threw back a good portion of his coffee.

Near stood in the corner, pulling at their jacket sleeves and twisting a platinum blonde curl on one finger.

Ryuzaki looked up and waited and finally, Near spoke.

“A’s dead,” Near said. “Able.”

Ryuzaki felt something wince inside him in pity and surprise.

“Able…” He said thoughtfully, like he was trying to place the name. “From Wammy’s.”

“Yes,” Near said. 

“I’m sorry,” Ryuzaki said. He took another generous swig of coffee. Evidently, he’d be needing it today.

“They… Disappeared. Roger won’t tell us exactly what they did, but we all know they’re dead.”

Interesting that Ryuzaki had not been made aware of this earlier. He hummed, dissatisfied.

“Did you come here just to tell me that?” He asked. 

Near pulled at their hair some more.

“No,” they said.

“Does Watari or Mr Ruvie know where you are.”

“No.”

Again, Ryuzaki wanted to grind his teeth together. He didn’t want to be involved in Wammy’s affairs more than necessary.

“So what do you need, Near.”

Near nodded briskly. “It’s getting bad there again. So I left.”

“Bad how.”

“You were there once, right? You know.” They said this not awkwardly or shamefully, but almost accusatory. There was something biting about everything they said, something almost smug which was amazing given that Near was not the one in much of a position to be smug. It did pique Ryuzaki’s interest just a little, though.

“It wasn’t bad. You eat. You have beds. Watari does everything in his power to make those homes good places.”

“It’s draining.”

Ryuzaki made a hmm sound.

“It made Able want to die.”

Ryuzaki pressed his mouth closed now and he stared at Near. Quiet kid. Sweet kid. But they had a sass in them that Ryuzaki wouldn’t have necessarily anticipated. They were also clearly a little intimidated by him, but Ryuzaki didn’t get the feeling that they really  _ liked _ him perse. They were just a little afraid of him. 

And they were tired. Despite their controlled demeanor, there was something of an anxiety deep in them, in the way they wouldn’t stop twisting that piece of hair between their fingertips.

Ryuzaki had to get them back to Mr Wammy, just dump off this problem. How had they even found him to begin with??

“I just didn’t want to be there. But I didn’t have anywhere to go. I don’t know anyone. But I’d met you once and thought I might stay here until things calm down at home. I thought I could help you. I’m second on the leaderboards right now. That’s a big deal. I could help you on your cases. I’d much prefer that to sitting alone at Wammy’s with everyone hating me.” Ryuzaki screwed the top off his tumbler now and turned it upside-down over his mouth and then he fished out the thick residue of sugar off the bottom and sides with his fingers and licked it off.

“You know that’s not going to happen,” Ryuzaki said. “I have to call Watari.”

Near was quiet.

“Okay,” they said. Their voice revealed no disappointment.

“What about that place could possibly be so bad?” Ryuzaki continued.

Near hugged their leather jacket around themself tighter.

“Well, Able’s  _ dead _ and no one will let us talk about it. And Backup just locks himself in his room or breaks stuff all day and he’s loud and angry. My only friend is Mello, but Mello is also friends with Backup and he likes Backup more, so he’s with him all the time instead of with me. But Backup scares me and he’s even worse now. No one wants to talk to me because I’m second on the leaderboards. Every day I spend there, I feel like I’m choking. I’m alone and I’m scared.”

They looked exhausted and a little distraught, but they said these words as if they were just facts, albeit ones that made them sad. But that’s all there was. There was a tired sadness instead of the hysterics Ryuzaki might have expected from a kid their age in such a situation.

“So you came here,” Ryuzaki said.

“I just need to breathe,” Near said, as though this were a casual and off-hand comment, and then they sat down very carefully on the floor, one knee up and the other down, the piece of hair near their ear still around their finger. The anxiety that Ryuzaki had read in them earlier started to melt now that they’d grounded themself. “If you really don’t want me, I’ll find someplace else, but I thought this could be a good opportunity.”

“I can’t just hide you from Watari and Mr Ruvie.”

“Then don’t. Tell them I’ll just stay with you a little while.”

“I don’t know how to take care of kids.”

“I’m not a kid. I take care of myself.”

“I don’t like living with people.”

“Neither do I.”

Ryuzaki stared down from his perch on the couch to where Near sat on the floor.

“I don’t like  _ people _ ,” Ryuzaki said.

“You like your neighbor,” Near said. “You made him coffee.”

“He’s a suspect and I’m buttering him up.”

“Oh.”

“I’m a very cruel, cold-hearted person, Near. You can’t come here and expect my good graces.”

“I don’t expect anything,” Near said. “I just thought I’d-” They shrugged and then smiled at Ryuzaki almost sadly. “Give it a shot.”

“It’s not every day a kid runs away from Wammy’s,” Ryuzaki said.

“Yes, it is,” Near said, which sort of surprised Ryuzaki. “They won’t look for me until a few days. And Mr Ruvie is tied up with Able and Backup and everyone else. They’re all in a panic because Able’s dead.”

“How do you know Able is dead if Mr Ruvie tells you otherwise.”

Near looked down at the floor and then spoke even more quietly.

“Able talked about death a lot. They were counting down the days. And then they disappeared.”

Ryuzaki picked up a sugar cube from the bowl in front of him and twisted it in his fingers and then he popped it into his mouth and let it dissolve on his tongue. He let Near’s words linger in the air until finally, Near pulled themself to their feet.

“It’s okay, Mr Ryuzaki,” they said. “I’ll find somewhere else.”

“Hold on,” Ryuzaki said. Near looked up at his face. “How exactly did you find me?”

“Mr Watari has your information on his phone and he doesn’t guard it as closely when he’s at the house.”

For a minute, they were frozen in place, staring at each other.

Ryuzaki was  _ not _ involved with Wammy’s House. He did  _ not _ care about these children. He felt absolutely no empathy or concern for their situation, especially not because it was so close to his own. He did not care that they were stressed or neglected or panicked or alone and he was  _ not _ good or kind.

But then again, maybe Near  _ could _ be helpful.

He stood up. Near’s blue eyes followed him.

“Sleep on the couch,” Ryuzaki said. “I’ll bring you a blanket, but you have to make yourself dinner.”


	17. Chapter 17

Near slept for several hours. They refused to take off the leather jacket, even when Ryuzaki tried to insist because they wouldn’t sleep well in it. And when they woke up, Ryuzaki brought them a plate of what he was eating for dinner. It ordinarily would have been yet another attempt to finish off a whole cake in a sitting, but today for no related reasons at all, he had decided to heat up some “real food”, which translated to soup from the can.

Near ate ferociously, clearly starving.

“How did you get here,” Ryuzaki asked.

“Flew,” Near said. “But I’d never done it before. I trailed around some families at the airport until they called my plane. I hated it.”

“And then you took a cab here?”

“Yes.”

“Where did you get all this money?”

Near put their empty soup bowl down.

“I pickpocketed Mr Ruvie,” they said and smiled again. There was something so mischievous about them that Ryuzaki hadn’t notice the last time he’d helped them through a case. They were a little difficult to pin down, which Ryuzaki liked because it made them interesting. They were somewhere between smug and scheming and sad.

While they talked, Near had reached their hand into their jacket pocket and pulled out a small, wooden model train with moving wheels and they ran it back and forth over their palm.

“You know,” Ryuzaki said. “You should have knocked instead of sitting out on the porch all night.”

“I did knock,” Near said. “I knocked a lot. You didn’t hear.”

Hmm. Ryuzaki  _ had _ fallen asleep for a few hours last night, despite his best efforts, but woke up again soon anyway. Must have been sometime between 4:30 and 6.

“I still have Roger’s credit card,” Near said and they stood up off the couch. “I’m going to pick some things up.”

Ryuzaki didn’t know much about kids, but he knew enough to know that you shouldn’t send them off alone.

“It’s fine,” Near said as if they’d read his mind. “Really. I can take care of myself.”

Ryuzaki didn’t really want to go out. He was tempted to just let Near go.

But then again, Near knew where he lived, and what he was doing, and who he was. If someone grabbed them and forced them to talk, Ryuzaki’s whole plan would crumble and he couldn’t let Light get away that easy. But if he just insisted that Near stay in the house, they’d slip out anyway, just like they’d done at Wammy’s. Ryuzaki was in a bit of a tough position.

He stood up off the couch.

“I’ll go with you,” he said.

Near wanted to be taken to a toy store. They held Roger’s credit card in their hands, rubbing the rectangular edges against the palms of their hands, staring out the front windshield from the passenger seat. Ryuzaki turned the car on and pulled it out of the parking lot.

By the time they reached the supermarket, Near was holding onto the edges of their seat tightly.

“You don’t know how to drive,” Near said.

“Yes, I do,” Ryuzaki said.

“Not  _ well _ ,” Near said. “We almost got hit twice.”

“That’s their problem,” Ryuzaki said. He turned the car off and opened the door and stepped out and Near stepped out too. “Besides, you can’t drive, either.”

“I could learn,” Near said.

Ryuzaki ignored this and started towards the store.

They walked up and down the aisles together, an odd pair, and for every pastry or bag of chocolates or box of coffee creamers that Ryuzaki threw into the cart, Near threw in their own collection of plastic robots and handfuls of playing card boxes and bags of dice and model paint and glue.

“What are you going to do with that?” Ryuzaki asked when Near tossed in at least five bags of wooden tongue depressors. 

“I can make a sculpture,” they said.

“I don’t have a particularly large apartment.”

“It’ll be small.”

Back at home (having narrowly avoided only one wreck this time), Near sat on the couch and unwrapped nearly everything they’d bought and Ryuzaki stood in the kitchen and poured chocolate milk into his mouth from the carton.

“Tell me about your case,” Near said. They looked up from where they held one small plastic robot in their hands.

“All you need to know is that you can’t let anyone know who I am,” Ryuzaki said. “If you do, I’m dead and you’re dead.” 

“And your neighbor?”

“Will be very much alive and will win and we can’t let that happen.”

“Who is he?”

“This is all top secret, Near.”

“I’m not stupid. Tell me.”

Ryuzaki and Near eyed each other from across the living room and Ryuzaki hummed disapprovingly. He took another long drink from the container and then wiped off his face with his fingers.

“His name is Light Yagami. And he’s killing people.”

“Why do you have to ‘butter him up’?”

“What?”

“That’s what you said earlier,” Near said. “When you gave him coffee.”

“Oh,” Ryuzaki said. “Because he has to trust me.”

When Ryuzaki had first begun to live on his own several months ago, an entirely new experience for him, he’d expected a few things that he’d been proven wrong about. One is that he thought it’d be easier. He was almost humbled to learn the amount of things he didn’t know how to do and was staggeringly bad at. ( _ Almost _ humbled because one thing he was always good at without fail was boistering his own ego and refusing to change. If anything came out of this experience miraculously intact, it would at the very least be his inflated sense of self-importance despite failure after domestic failure.)

He was bad at cooking, bad at baking, bad at cleaning, bad at making phone calls, bad at shopping for groceries, bad at driving, bad at… Everything. And it wasn’t entirely his fault, after all, he’d never had to do a single one of those things before and he had to learn them all fast. And he was a very quick learner too, but it didn’t stop half of his shirts being dyed pink in the laundry, among countless other missteps. So there had been an unexpected learning curve.

Another thing he’d assumed wrongly was that living alone would be more lonely. He thought this because he’d heard other people say it and he’d seen people talk about it on TV, that living by yourself sometimes made people sad or made them desperate for company and so this was something he expected when he moved in. But he wasn’t any more lonely than usual. The house wasn’t too quiet and he didn’t miss the presence of other people. This, he realized then, was because it wasn’t new. He’d basically been living alone this entire time. For years. Since he’d moved out of Wammy’s permanently at sixteen to begin working full time, he’d been alone. Of course, he hadn’t  _ really _ because Mr Wammy was always there, but that was just the thing-he wasn’t there. Ryuzaki never saw him. He’d bring him dinner and straighten up rooms every so often, but they rarely talked. Mr Wammy didn’t chat or make noise. He didn’t invade Ryuzaki’s living space and Ryuzaki didn’t invade his. Mr Wammy was a ghost to him, might as well not even be there. So this is one reason why Ryuzaki didn’t notice his absence as much as expected. He was already just about as lonely as he could be and he couldn’t possibly add to that-he’d peaked in the loneliness department a long time ago. Can’t fall further when you’ve already hit rock bottom.

But slowly, these things were on the mend. Ryuzaki was learning to do the things he’d never been taught to do and certain circumstances were starting to curb this loneliness he had.

It was like some sort of ravenous monster inside him, he thought, and he constantly had to reign it back in. If he didn’t control himself, he’d jump Light the next chance he got just to feel that he was there. He’d drag him back into his apartment to hold his hands and keep him there just to look at him. If a lid was knocked off of the control inside him and he’d talk to, or  _ at _ , Light for hours and then stop just long enough to hear Light’s voice, too. He’d scream and smash plates on walls and pull out his hair. He’d spend all his time on the streets, bumping into other people, being touched by them, talking to them, keeping Light always, always within reach. Always holding his hand.

Sometimes he got so good at hiding his own pain even from himself that he didn’t notice how much it hurt until he thought at random intervals that his heart might collapse and then he had to sift through the events of the day in his mind to try and piece his fractured emotions back together to understand what had triggered this ache. It was all so backwards. He’d feel the hurt before he even knew what had hurt him.

While Light was at work the next day, Near sat around and glued tongue depressors together into shapes Ryuzaki couldn’t recognize while Ryuzaki himself took out his copy of Light’s key and entered his house.

Of course Light would not leave his house unguarded in some way. It was unlikely that he’d booby trapped it in a way that could actually physically hurt Ryuzaki-after all, how would he explain it if he hurt someone? It wasn’t his style. And if he’d set up cameras, Ryuzaki would be sure to find them and break them. But Ryuzaki had an idea of how Light would do it.

When Ryuzaki was younger, he'd booby trapped his room for practically no reason at all. The traps told him when anyone went inside and what they had disturbed and he checked them methodically. They were pieces of pencil lead in door hinges and small pieces of paper on top of stacks of clothes and threads that would snap if cupboard doors pulled open. And he and Light were like one person-he would bet  _ money _ that that’s what Light had done and Ryuzaki knew exactly how to find and reset these traps.

He stepped inside the apartment and shut the door behind him and began to search the house.

He found pencil lead in every single door hinge and in nearly all the cupboards and small paper shreds inside drawers. He took mental note of every one to replace them all.

The thing was that as a kid, Ryuzaki had started to become overly aware of his status as a private yet extremely unprivate person. As L, he was a well-recognized name. He was constantly available, constantly talked about, in a public eye. He loved the accolades and the power and the work and he loved to being the smartest person in the room, which he always was. He liked his life. But sometimes it just got tiring was all. And no one really knew him. People talked about L, but it was like he lived two lives-one as L and one as a strange, lonely kid who sat alone in his room. He was constantly alone and yet not alone and it was a strange thing to live with.

So this was why Ryuzaki had booby trapped his room and claimed that there was no reason. It was because he had no true privacy and no true peace and because he was already so lonely, so painfully, achingly lonely, that if anyone cared enough to open his bedroom door or move around his things, he wanted to know. He didn't want to stop them. He just wanted to know.

There were no cameras in Light’s house so Ryuzaki left some of his own for case purposes. Then, he started the  _ real _ work, which was to cut out the bottoms of every pocket Light had. Ryuzaki ripped out the seams in the pockets of all his suit jackets, his pants, his pocketed button-ups, everything. He even sliced out the bottoms in the obligatory collection of plastic grocery store bags that he kept under the sink, which he really congratulated himself on.

(In the closet, he found something. Pushed into the way back was a shoebox and inside was a small tin of sugar and a cut of a suspiciously familiar rug. When he found it, Ryuzaki stared for a long time and then he slammed the box shut and shoved it back.)

He replaced every single trap he’d set off in the house and he left.

He was still thinking about his loneliness when he stepped back into his own apartment. Having Light around and having Near in the house was a relief that Ryuzaki could barely begin to put into words. But at the same time, he knew that Near was only there to hide and that Light just might kill him if given the chance.

The next day was Saturday. Light predictably couldn’t go to dinner because he had overtime to do for work (not to mention a lot of sewing to do). Ryuzaki spent the day lying on his couch, staring at the white ceiling and pulled at the roots of his hair, thinking about the box he’d found in Light’s closet.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay here's the deal, folks. This work is part of a series, A Fragile Sort of Friendship, and this work and the first go on simultaneously. I'm going to work on them and post them at the same time and you should feel free to read them both at once!! The first work is Birthday Massacre-centered and you can find it here!! https://archiveofourown.org/works/16382351/chapters/38342912


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